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Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



WORKS OF 




FRANCIS MILTOUN 


;!^^ 




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Ro^al Palaces and Parks of France 


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Castles and Chateaux of Old Touraine 




and the Loire Country 


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Castles and Chateaux of Old Navarre 




and the Basque Provinces 


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ROYAL PALACES AND 
PARKS OF FRANCE 

By Francis Miltoun. 

Author of "Castles and Chateaux of Old Touraine." "Castles 
and Chateaux of Old Burgundy," " Rambles in Nor- 
mandy," "Italian Highways and Byways 
from a Motor-Car," etc. 

With Many Illustrations 
Reproduced from pfy.riti , wade on the spot 

By Blanch McManus 



miaO ^moZ ^\ nnaU \o sDmt^T 




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^-S^^^'V'^^^ 



BOSTON 
L. C. PAGE & COMPANY 

I 9 I o 




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Terrace ofi Henri IV^ Saint Germain 

(See page ^86) 



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VU-o^'^ 



^ 



ROYAL PALACES AND 
PARKS OF FRANCE 



By Francis Miltoun ,, 

Author of "Castles and Chateaux of Old Touraine," "Castles 
and Chateaux of Old Burgundy," " Rambles in Nor- 
mandy," "Italian Highways and Byways 
from a Motor-Car," etc. 

^ith Many Illustrations 
Reproduced from paintings made on the spot 

By Blanche McManus 




BOSTON 
L. C. PAGE & COMPANY 

I 9 I o 



^0 



T^ 



Copyright, 1910, 

By L. C. Page & Company, 
(incobporated) 



All rights reserved 



Pirst Impression, November, 1910 



Printed by 
THE COLONIAL PRESS 
C. H. Simonds & Co., Boston, U. S. A. 



©CI.A275G65 



Preface 

" A thousand years ago, by the rim of a tiny spring, a 
monk who had avowed himself to the cult of Saint Saturnin, 
robed, cowled and sandalled, knelt down to say a prayer to 
his beloved patron saint. Again he came, this time followed 
by more of his kind, and a wooden cross was planted by 
the side of the " Fontaine Belle Eau," by this time become 
a place of pious pilgrimage. After the monk came a king, 
the latter to hunt in the neighbouring forest." 

It was this old account of fact, or legend, that 
led the author and illustrator of this book to a 
full realization of the wealth of historic and 
romantic incidents connected with the French 
royal parks and palaces, incidents which the 
makers of guidebooks have passed over in favour 
of the, presumably, more important, well au- 
thenticated facts of history which are often the 
bare recitals of political rises and falls and dull 
chronologies of building up and tearing down. 

Much of the history of France was made in 
the great national forests and the royal country- 
houses of the kingdom, but usually it has been 
only the events of the capital which have been 
passed in review. To a great extent this history 



11 



Preface 



was of the gallant, daring kind, often written in 
blood, the sword replacing the pen. 

At times gayety reigned supreme, and at times it 
was sadness; but always the pageant was imposing. 

The day of pageants has passed, the day when 
lords and ladies moved through stately halls, 
when royal equipages hunted deer or boar on 
royal preserves, when gay cavalcades of solemn 
corteges thronged the great French highways 
to the uttermost frontiers and ofttimes beyond. 
Those days have passed; but, to one who knows 
the real France, a ready-made setting is ever 
at hand if he would depart a little from the beaten 
paths worn smooth by railway and automobile 
tourists who follow only the lines of conventional 
travel. 

France, even to-day, the city and the country 
alike, is the paradise of European monarchs 
on a holiday.' One may be met at Biarritz on 
the shores of the Gascon gulf; another may be 
taking the waters at Aix or Vichy, shooting 
pigeons under the shadow of the Tete de Chien, 
or hunting at Rambouillet. This is modern 
France, the most cosmopolitan meeting place 
and playground of royalty in the world. 

French royal parks and palaces, those of the 
kings and queens of mediaeval, as well as later, 
times, differ greatly from those of other lands. 



Preface iii 



This is perhaps not so much in their degree of 
splendour and luxury as in the sentiment which 
attaches itself to them. In France there has 
ever been a spirit of gayety and spontaneity 
unknown elsewhere. It was this which in- 
spired the construction and maintenance of such 
magnificent royal residences as the palaces of 
Saint Germain-en-Laye, Fontainebleau, Ver- 
sailles, Compiegne, Rambouillet, etc., quite dif- 
ferent from the motives which caused the erec- 
tion of the Louvre, the Tuileries or the Palais 
Cardinal at Paris. 

Nowhere else does there exist the equal of 
these inspired royal country-houses of France, 
and, when it comes to a consideration of their 
surrounding parks and gardens, or those royal 
hunting preserves in the vicinity of the He de 
France, or of those still further afield, at Ram- 
bouillet or in the Loire country, their superiority 
to similar domains beyond the frontiers is even 
more marked. 

In plan this book is a series of itineraries, at 
least the chapters are arranged, to a great ex- 
tent in a topographical sequence; and, if the 
scope is not as wide as all France, it is because 
of the prominence already given to the parks 
and palaces of Touraine and elsewhere in the 
old French provinces in other works in which 



iv Preface 

the artist and author have collaborated. It 
is for this reason that so little consideration 
has been given to Chambord, Amboise or Chenon- 
ceaux, which were as truly royal as any of that 
magnificent group of suburban Paris palaces 
which begins with Conflans and ends with Marly 
and Versailles. 

Going still further afield, there is in the Pyrenees 
that chateau, royal from all points of view, in 
which was born the gallant Henri of France 
and Navarre, but a consideration of that, too, 
has already been included in another volume. 

The present survey includes the royal dwell- 
ings of the capital, those of the faubourgs and 
the outlying districts far enough from town to 
be recognized as in the country, and still others 
as remote as Rambouillet, Chantilly and Com- 
piegne. All, however, were intimately connected 
with the life of the capital in the mediaeval and 
Renaissance days, and together form a class 
distinct from any other monumental edifices 
which exist, or ever have existed, in France. 

Mere historic fact has been subordinated as 
far as possible to a recital of such picturesque 
incidents of the life of contemporary times as the 
old writers have handed down to us, and a com- 
plete chronological review has in no manner 
been attempted. 




CHAPTER 

I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 

V. 

VI. 

VII. 
VIII. 

IX. 

X. 

XI. 

XII. 
XIII. 
XIV. 

XV. 
XVI. 

XVII. 
XVIII. 



PAGE 



13 
14 
43 
61 
75 



Introductory 

The Evolution of French Gardens 

The Royal Hunt in France 

The Palais de la Cite and Tournelles . 

The Old Louvre and Its History 

The Louvre of Francis I and Its Suc- 
cessors 

The Tuileries and Its Gardens 

The Palais Cardinal and the Palais 
Royal 

The Luxembourg, the Elysee and the 
Palais Bourbon . 

ViNCENNES AND CoNFLANS 

Fontainebleau and Its Forest 
By the Banks of the Seine 
Malmaison and Marly . 
Saint Cloud and Its Park . 
Versailles: The Glory of France . 
The Gardens of Versailles and the 

Trianons 

Saint Germain-en-Laye .... 
Maintenon 296 

V 



85 
106 

131 

151 

168 
180 
203 
215 
229 
244 

260 

279 



vi Contents 

CHAPTEB PAGE 

XIX. Rambouillet and Its Forest . . . 309 
XX. Chantilly 324 

XXI. COMPIEGNE AND ItS FoREST . . . .342 

Index 363 




PAOB 

Terrace of Henri IV, Saint Germain (see page 

286) Frontispiece 

The Louvre, the Tuileries and the Palais Royal 

OF To-day facing 12 

" Jardin Francais — Jardin Anglais " . . .15 

Henri IV in an Old French Garden . facing 20 

Parterre de Diane, Chenonceaux .... 27 

Plan of Sunken Garden (Jardin Creux) . . 30 

A Parterre . . . . . . . facing 32 

Bassin de la Couronne, Vaux-le-Vicomte facing 42 

A " Curee aux Flambeaux " . . . facing 46 

An Imperial Hunt at Fontainebleau . facing 52 

Rendezvous de Chasse, Rambouillet . facing 56 

Bird's Eye View of Old Paris (Map) . facing 74 

The XIV Century Louvre .... facing 82 

The Louvre facing 90 

Original Plan of the Tuileries (Diagram) . . 106 

Salle des Marechaux, Tuileries . . facing 116 

The Galleries of the Palais Royal . . . 146 
Bourbon-Orleans Descendants of Loufs Philippe 

(Diagram) facing 146 

Palais du Luxembourg .... facing 154 

Door in Throne Room, Luxembourg . . . 156 

The Petit Luxembourg facing 156 

The Luxembourg Gardens .... facing 158 

The Throne of the Palais Bourbon . . . 161 

ViNCENNES under Charles V 168 

vii 



Vlll 



List of Illustrations 



FAGB 



Chateau de Vincennes .... 
A Hunt under the Walls of Vincennes 

conflans 

Original Plan of Fontainebleau 
From Paris to Fontainebleau (Map) 
Palais de Fontainebleau 
Salle du Throne, Fontainebleau 
Fragments from Fontainebleau 
Cheminee de la Reine, Fontainebleau 
Monument to Rousseau and Millet at 

Barbison .... 
Chateau de Bagatelle . 
Chateau de Malmaison 
The Gardens of Saint Cloud 
The Cascades at Saint Cloud 
CouR DE Marbre, Versailles 
The Potager du Roy, Versailles 
The Bassin de Latone, Versailles . 
The Fountain of Neptune, Versailles 

Petit Trianon 

Laiterie de la Reine, Petit Trianon 

Saint Germain (Diagram) 

The Valley of the Seine, from the 

Saint Germain 

Fauteuil of Mme. de Maintenon 
Chateau de Maintenon .... 
Aqueduct of Louis XIV at Maintenon 
Chateau de Rambouillet (Diagram) . 
Laiterie de la Reine, Rambouillet . 
Chateau de Rambouillet . . . 
Chantilly (Diagram) .... 
Statue of Le Notre, Chantilly 
Chateau de Chantilly .... 
Compiegne (Diagram) .... 
Napoleon's Bedchamber, Compeigne . 
CouRS DE Compiegne .... 



facing 172 

facing 174 

. 176 

. 180 

facing 180 

facing 186 

facing 190 

facing 192 

facing 194 



facing 

facing 
facing 
facing 
facing 
facing 
facing 
facing 
facing 



200 
204 

218 
236 
240 
264 
270 
272 
274 
276 
277 
280 



Terrace at 

facing 288 

. 297 

facing 300 

facing 306 

. 309 

facing 312 

facing 316 

. 325 

facing 326 

facing 336 

. 343 

facing 352 

facing 356 



Royal Palaces and Parks 
of France 



CHAPTER I 

INTRODUCTORY 

The modern traveller sees something beyond 
mere facts. Historical material as identified 
with the life of some great architectural glory 
is something more than a mere repetition of 
chronologies; the sidelights and the co-related 
incidents, though indeed many of them may be 
but hearsay, are quite as interesting, quite as 
necessary, in fact, for the proper appreciation 
of a famous palace or chateau as long columns 
of dates, or an evolved genealogical tree which 
attempts to make plain that which could be better 
left unexplained. The glamour of history would 
be considerably dimmed if everything was ex- 
plained, and a very seamy block of marble may 
be chiselled into a very acceptable statue if the 
workman but knows how to avoid the doubt- 
ful parts. 

1 



2 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



An itinerary that follows not only the ridges, 
but occasionally plunges down into the hollows 
and turns up or down such crossroads as may 
have chanced to look inviting, is perhaps more 
interesting than one laid out on conventional 
lines. A shadowy something, which for a better 
name may be called sentiment, if given full play 
encourages these side-steps, and since they are 
generally found fruitful, and often not too fa- 
tiguing, the procedure should be given every 
encouragement. 

Not all the interesting royal palaces and cha- 
teaux of France are those with the best known 
names. Not all front on Paris streets and quays, 
no more than the best glimpses of ancient or 
modern France are to be had from the benches 
of a sight-seeing automobile. 

Versailles, and even Fontainebleau, are too 
frequently considered as but the end of a half- 
day pilgrimage for the tripper. It were better 
that one should approach them more slowly, 
and by easy stages, and leave them less hurriedly. 
As for those architectural monuments of kings, 
which were tuned in a minor key, they, at all 
events, need to be hunted down on the spot, the 
enthusiast being forearmed with such scraps of 
historic fact as he can gather beforehand, other- 
wise he will see nothing at Confians, Marly or 



Introductory 3 

Bourg-la-Reine which will suggest that royalty 
ever had the slightest concern therewith. 

Dealing first with Paris it is evident it is there 
that the pilgrim to French shrines must make his 
most profound obeisance. This applies as well 
to palaces as to churches. In all cases one goes 
back into the past to make a start, and old Paris, 
what there is left of it, is still old Paris, though 
one has to leave the grand boulevards to find 
this out. 

Colberts and Haussmanns do not live to-day, 
or if they do they have become so ^^ practical" 
that a drainage canal or an overhead or under- 
ground railway is more of a civic improvement 
than the laying out of a public park, like the 
gardens of the Tuileries, or the building and 
embellishment of a public edifice — at least with 
due regard for the best traditions. When the 
monarchs of old called in men of taste and culture 
instead of "business men" they builded in the 
most agreeable fashion. We have not improved 
things with our "systems" and our committees 
of ^'hommes d^ajjairesV 

It is the fashion to-day to decry the cavaliers 
and the wearers of "love-locks," but they had 
a pretty taste in art and an eye for artistic sur- 
roundings, those old fellows of the sword and 
cloak; a much more pretty taste than their de- 



4 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



scendants, the steam-heat and running-water par- 
tisans of to-day. Louis XV and Empire draw- 
ing and dining-rooms are everywhere adver- 
tised as the attractions of the great palace 
hotels, and some of them are very good copies 
of their predecessors, though one cannot help 
but feel that the clientele as a whole is more in- 
sistent on telephones in the bedrooms and auto- 
taxis always on tap than with regard to the senti- 
ment of good taste and good cheer which is to be 
evoked by eating even a hurried meal in a room 
which reproduces some historically famous Salle 
des Gardes or the Chambre of the Oeil de Boeuf 
of the Louvre, if, indeed, most of the hungry folk 
know what their surroundings are supposed to 
represent. 

Any chronicle which attempts to set down a 
record of the comings and goings of French 
monarchs is saved from being a mere dull chro- 
nology of dates and resume of facts by its obli- 
gatory references to the architects and builders 
who made possible the splendid settings amid 
which these picturesque rulers passed their lives. 

The castle builders of France, the garden 
designers, the architects, decorators and crafts- 
men of all ranks produced not a medley, but a 
coherent, cohesive whole, which stands apart from, 
and far ahead of, most of the contemporary work 



Introductory 



of its kind in other lands. Castles and keeps 
were of one sort in England and Scotland, of 
still another along the Rhine, and if the Renais- 
sance palaces and chateaux first came into being 
in Italy it is certain they never grew to the flower- 
ing luxuriance there that they did in France. 

Thus does France establish itself as leader 
in new movements once again. It was so in 
the olden time with the arts of the architect, the 
landscape gardener and the painter; it is so to- 
day with respect to such mundane, less senti- 
mental things as automobiles and aeroplanes. 

Another chapter, in a story long since started, 
is a repetition, or review, of the outdoor life of 
the French monarchs and their followers. Not 
only did Frenchmen of Gothic and Renaissance 
times have a taste for travelling far afield, pur- 
suing the arts of peace or war as their conscience 
or conditions dictated; but they loved, too, the 
open country and the open road at home; they 
loved also la chasse, as they did tournaments, 
jetes-champkres and outdoor spectacles of all 
kinds. Add these stage settings to the splendid 
costuming and the flamboyant architectural ac- 
cessories of Renaissance times in France and we 
have what is assuredly not to be found in other 
lands, a spectacular and imposing pageant of 
mediaeval and Renaissance life and manners 



6 R oyal Palaces and Parks of France 

which is superlative from all points of view. 

This is perhaps hard, sometimes, to reconcile 
with the French attitude towards outdoor hfe 
to-day, when la chasse means the hunting of tame 
foxes (a sport which has been imported from 
across the channel), ^^sporV^ means a prize fight, 
and a garden party or a jete-champetre a mere 
gossiping rendezvous over a cup of badly made 
tea. In the France of the olden time they did 
things differently — and better. 

Not all French history was made, or written, 
within palace walls; much of it came into being 
in the open air, like the two famous meetings 
by the Bidassoa, Napoleon's first sight of Marie 
Louise on the highroad leading out from Senlis, 
or his making the Pope a prisoner at the Croix 
de Saint Heram, in the Forest of Fontainebleau. 

It is this change of scene that makes French 
history so appealing to those who might other- 
wise let it remain in shut-up and dry-as-dust 
books on library shelves. 

The French monarchs of old were indeed 
great travellers, and it is by virtue of the fact that 
affairs of state were often promulgated and con- 
summated en voyage that a royal stamp came to 
be acquired by many a chateau or country-house 
which to-day would hardly otherwise be con- 
sidered as of royal rank. 



Introductory 



Throughout France, notably in the neighbour- 
hood of Paris, are certain chateaux — palaces 
only by lack of name — of the nobility where 
royalties were often as much at home as under 
their own royal standards. One cannot attempt 
to confine the limits where these chateaux are to 
be found, for they actually covered the length 
and breadth of France. 

Journeying afield in those romantic times 
was probably as comfortably accomplished, by 
monarchs at least, as it is to-day. What was 
lacking was speed, but they lodged at night under 
roofs as hospitable as those of the white and gold 
caravanserai (and some more humble) which 
perforce come to be temporary abiding places 
of royalties en tour to-day. The writer has seen 
the Dowager Queen of Italy lunching at a neigh- 
bouring table at a roadside trattoria in Piedmont 
which would have no class distinction whatever 
as compared with the average suburban road- 
house across the Atlantic. At Biarritz, too, the 
automobihng monarch, Alphonse XIII, has been 
known to take " tea " on the terrace of the 
great tourist - peopled hotel in company with 
mere be-goggled commoners. Le temps va! Were 
monarchs so democratic in the olden time, one 
wonders. 

The court chronicles of all ages, and all ranks, 



8 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



have proved a gold mine for the makers of books 
of all sorts and conditions. Not only court 
chroniclers but pamphleteers, even troubadours 
and players, have contributed much to the records 
of the Hfe of mediaeval France. All history was 
not made by political intrigue or presumption; 
a good deal of it was born of the gentler passions, 
and a chap-book maker would put often into 
print many accounts which the recorder of mere 
history did not dare use. ^History is often enough 
sorry stuff when it comes to human interest, 
and it needs editing only too often. 

Courtiers and the fashionable world of France, 
ever .since the days of the poetry-making and 
ballad-singing Francis and Marguerite, and be- 
fore, for that matter, made of literature — at 
least the written and spoken chronicle of some 
sort — a diversion and an accomplishment. 
Royal or official patronage given these mediaeval 
story-tellers did not always produce the truest 
tales. Then, as now, writer folk were wont tq 
exaggerate, but most of their work made in- 
teresting reading. 

These courtiers of the itching pen did not often 
write for money. Royal favour, or that of some 
fair lady, or ladies, was their chief return in many 
more cases than those for which their accounts 
were settled by mere dross. It is in the work 



Introductory 



of such chroniclers as these that one finds a fund 
of unrepeated historic lore. 

The dramatists came on the scene with their 
plots ready-made (and have been coming 
ever since, if one recalls the large number of 
French costume plays of recent years), and 
whether they introduced errors of fact, or not, 
there was usually so much truth about their 
work that the very historians more than once 
were obliged to have recourse to the productions 
of their colleagues. The dramatists' early days 
in France, as in England, were their golden days. 
The mere literary man, or chronicler, was often 
flayed alive, but the dramatist, even though he 
dished up the foibles of a king, and without 
any dressing at that, was feted and made as much 
of as a record piano player of to-day. 

One hears a lot about the deathbed scrib- 
blers in England in the sixteenth and seven- 
teenth centuries, but there was not much of that 
sort of thing in France. No one here penned 
bitter jibes and lascivious verses merely to keep 
out of jail, as did Nash and Marlowe in England. 
In short, one must give due credit to the court 
chroniclers and ballad-singers of France as being 
something more than mere pilfering, black- 
mailing hacks. 

All the French court and its followers in the 



10 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

sixteenth century shouted epigrams and affected 
being greater poets than they really were. It 
was a good sign, and it left its impress on French 
literature. Following in the footsteps of Fran- 
cis I and the two Marguerites nobles vied with 
each other in their efforts to produce some 
epoch-making work of poesy or prose, and while 
they did not often publish for profit they were 
glad enough to see themselves in print. Then 
there were also the professional men of letters, 
as distinct from the courtiers with literary am- 
bitions, the churchmen and courtly attaches of 
all ranks with the literary bee humming in their 
bonnets. They, too, left behind them an im- 
posing record, which has been very useful to others 
coming after who were concerned with getting 
a local colour of a brand which should look 
natural. 

It is with such guiding lights as are suggested 
by the foregoing resume that one seeks his clues 
for the repicturing of the circumstances under 
which French royal palaces were erected, as well 
as for the truthful repetition of the ceremonies 
and functions of the times, for the court life of 
old, whether in city palace or country chateau, 
was a very different thing from that of the Re- 
publican regime of to-day. 

Not only were the royal Paris dwellings, from 



Introductory 11 



the earliest times, of a profound luxuriance of 
design and execution, but the private hotels, 
the palaces, one may well say, of the nobility 
were of the same superlative order, and kings 
and queens alike did not disdain to lodge therein 
on such occasions as suited their convenience. 
The suggestive comparison is made because of 
the close liens with which royalty and the higher 
nobility were bound. 

It is sufficient to recall, among others of this 
class, the celebrated Hotel de Beauvais which 
will illustrate the reference. Not only was this 
magnificent town house of palatial dimensions, 
but it was the envy of the monarchs themselves, 
because of its refined elegance of construction. 
This edifice exists to-day, in part, at No. 68 Rue 
Francois Miron, and the visitor may judge for 
himself as to its former elegance. 

Loret, in his "Gazette" in verse, recounts a 
visit made to the Hotel de Beauvais in 1663 by 
Marie Therese, the Queen of Louis XIV. 

Mercredi, notre auguste Reine, 
Cette charmante souveraine, 
Fut chez Madame de Beauvais 
Pour de son amiable palais 
Voir les merveilles etonnantes 
Et les r aretes surprenantes. 

Times have changed, for the worse or for the 
better. The sedan-chair and the coach have 



12 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

given way to the automobile and the engine, and 
the wood fire to a stale calorifer, or perhaps a 
gas-log. 

The comparisons are odious; there is no ques- 
tion as to this; but it is by contrast that the sub- 
ject is made the more interesting. 

From the old Palais des Thermes (now a part 
of the Musee de Cluny) of the Roman emperors 
down through the Palais de la Cite (where lodged 
the kings of the first and second races) to the 
modern installations of the Louvre is a matter 
of twelve centuries. The record is by no means 
a consecutive one, but a record exists which em- 
braces a dozen, at least, of the Paris abodes of 
royalty, where indeed they lived according to 
many varying scales of comfort and luxury. 

Not all the succeeding French monarchs had 
the abilities or the inclinations that enabled 
them to keep up to the traditions of the art-loving 
Francis I, but almost all of their number did 
something creditable in building or decoration, 
or commanded it to be done. 

J!^ouis XIV, though he delayed the adjustment 
of Europe for two centuries, was the first real 
beautifier of Paris since Philippe Auguste. Pri- 
vately his taste in art and architecture was rather 
ridiculous, but publicly he and his architects 
achieved great things in the general scheme. 




l?s'^il 







Introductory 13 



Napoleon I, in turn, caught up with things 
in a poHtical sense, in truth he ran ahead of them, 
but he in no way neglected the embellishments 
of the capital, and added a new wing to the 
Louvre, and filled Musees with stolen loot, which 
remorse, or popular clamour, induced him, for 
the most part, to return at a later day. 

In a decade Napoleon made much history, 
and he likewise did much for the royal palaces 
of France. After him a gap supervened until 
the advent of Napoleon III, who, weakling 
that he was, had the perspicacity to give the 
Baron Haussmann a chance to play his part in 
the making of modern Paris, and if the Tuileries 
and Saint Cloud had not disappeared as a result 
of his indiscretion the period of the Second Em- 
pire would not have been at all discreditable, 
as far as the impress it left on Paris was con- 
cerned. 



CHAPTER II 

THE EVOLUTION OF FRENCH GARDENS 

The French garden was a creation of all epochs 
from the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries, 
and, for the most part, those of to-day and of 
later decades of the nineteenth century, are 
adaptations and restorations of the classic ac- 
cepted forms. 

From the modest jardinet of the moyen-age 
to the ample gardens and parterres of the Renais- 
sance was a wide range. In their highest ex- 
pression these early French gardens, with their 
broderies and carreaux may well be compared 
as works of art with contemporary structures 
in stone or wood or stuffs in woven tapestries, 
which latter they greatly resembled. 

Under Louis XIV and Louis XV the elaborate- 
ness of the French garden was even more an 
accentuated epitome of the tastes of the period. 
Near the end of the eighteenth century a marked 
deterioration was noticeable and a separation 
of the tastes which ordained the arrangement 
of contemporary dwellings and their gardens 

14 



The Evolution of French Gardens 15 

was very apparent. Under the Empire the 
antique style of furniture and decoration was 
used too, but there was no contemporary ex- 
pression with regard to garden making. 

In the second half of the nineteenth century, 
under the Second Empire, the symmetrical lines 





JARDIN rR.A>ICAIS 



J-ATLDIH AN GrI-i-A 



^ 



of the old-time parterres came again into being, 
and to them were attached composite elements 
or motives, which more closely resembled details 
of the conventional English garden than any- 
thing distinctly French. 

The English garden was, for the most part, 
pure ajffectation in France, or, at best, it was treated 



16 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



as a frank exotic. Even to-day, in modern 
France, where an old dwelling of the period of 
Henri IV, Fran5;ois I, Louis XIII, Louis XIV, 
or Louis XV still exists with its garden, the latter 
is more often than not on the classically pure 
French lines, while that of a modern cottage, 
villa or chateau is often a poor, variegated thing, 
fantastic to distraction. 

Turning back the pages of history one finds 
that each people, each century, possessed its 
own specious variety of garden; a species which 
responded sufficiently to the tastes and necessi- 
ties of the people, to their habits and their 
aspirations. 

Garden-making, like the art of the architect, 
differed greatly in succeeding centuries, and it 
is for this reason that the garden of the moyen- 
age, of the epoch of the Crusades, for example, 
did not bear the least resemblance to the more 
ample parterres of the Renaissance. Civiliza- 
tion was making great progress, and it was neces- 
sary that the gardens should be in keeping with 
a less restrained, more luxurious method of life. 

If the gardens of the Renaissance marked 
a progress over the preaux and jardinets of mediae- 
valism, those of Le Notre were a blossoming 
forth of the Renaissance seed. Regretfully, one 
cannot say as much for the garden plots of the 



The Evolution of French Gardens 17 

eighteenth century, and it was only with the 
mid-nineteenth century that the general outlines 
took on a real charm and attractiveness again, 
and this was only achieved by going back to 
original principles. 

The first gardens were the vergers and preaux, 
little checker- board squares of a painful primitive- 
ness as compared with later standards. These 
squares, or carreatix, were often laid out in foliage 
and blossoming plants as suggestive as possible 
of their being made of carpeting or marble. 
When these miniature enclosures came to be 
surrounded with trellises and walls the Renais- 
sance in garden-making may be considered as 
having been in full sway. 

Under Louis XIV a certain affluence was 
noticeable in garden plots, and with Louis XV 
an even more notable symmetry was apparent 
in the disposition of the general outlines. By 
this time, the garden in France had become a 
frame which set off the architectural charms 
of the dwelling rather than remaining a mere 
accessory, but it was only with the replacing of 
the castle-fortress by the more domesticated 
chateau that a really generous garden space be- 
came a definite attribute of a great house. 

^The first gardens surrounding the French 
chateaux were developments, or adaptations, 



18 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

of Italian gardens, such as were designed across 
the Alps by Mercogliano, during the feudal 
period. 

Later, and during the time of the Crusades, 
the garden question hardly entered into French 
life. Gardens, like all other luxuries, were given 
little thought when the graver questions of peace 
and security were to be considered, and, for this 
reason, there is little or nothing to say of French 
gardens previous to the twelfth century. 

An important species of the gardens of the 
moyen-age was that which was found as an 
adjunct to the great monastic institutions, the 
preaux, which were usually surrounded by the 
cloister colonnade. One of the most important 
of these, of which history makes mention, was 
that of the Abbaye de Saint Gall, of which Char- 
lemagne was capitular. It was he who selected 
the plants and vegetables which the dwellers 
therein should cultivate. 

Of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries there 
is an abundant literary record, and, in a way, 
a pictorial record as well. From these one can 
make a very good deduction of what the garden 
of that day was like; still restrained, but yet 
something more than rudimentary. From now 
on French gardens were divided specifically 
into the potager and verger. 



The Evolution of French Gardens 19 

The potager was virtually a vegetable garden 
within the walls which surrounded the seigneurial 
dwelling, and was of necessity of very limited 
extent, chiefly laid out in tiny carreauXy or beds, 
bordered by tiles or bricks, much as a small 
city garden is arranged to-day. Here were cul- 
tivated the commonest vegetables, a few flowers 
and a liberal assortment of herbs, such as rue, 
mint, parsley, sage, lavender, etc. 

The verger, or viridarium, was practically 
a fruit garden, as it is to-day, with perhaps a 
generous sprinkling of flowers and aromatic 
plants. The verger was always outside the walls, 
but not far from the entrance or the drawbridge 
crossing the moat and leading to the chateau. 

It was to the verger, or orchard, curiously 
enough, that in times of peace the seigneur and 
his family retired after luncheon for diversion 
or repose. 

" D illocques vieng en cest vergier 
Eascun3 jour pour s'esbanoier." 

Thus ran a couplet of the ''Roman de Thebes"; 
and of the hundred or more tales of chivalry 
in verse, which are recognized as classic, nearly 
all make mention of the verger. 

.It was here that young men and maidens came 
in springtime for the fete of flowers, when they 



20 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

wove chaplets and garlands, for the moyen-age 
had preserved the antique custom of the coiffure 
of flowers, that is to say hats of natural flowers, 
as we might call them to-day, except that modern 
hats seemingly call for most of the products of 
the barnyard and the farm in their decoration, 
as well as the flowers of the field. 
• The rose was queen among all these flowers 
and then came the lily and the carnation, chiefly 
in their simple, savage state, not the highly 
cultivated product of to-day. From the ballads 
and the love songs, one gathers that there were 
also violets, eglantine, daisies, pansies, forget- 
me-nots, and the marguerite, or consoude, was 
one of the most loved of all. 

The carnation, or oeilletj was called armerie; 
the pansy was particularly in favour with the 
ladies, who embroidered it on their handker- 
chiefs and their girdles. Still other flowers found 
a place in this early horticultural catalogue, 
the marigold, gladiolus, stocks, lily-of-the-valley 
and buttercups. 

Frequently the verger was surrounded by a 
protecting wall, of more or less architectural 
pretense, with towers and accessories conform- 
ing to the style of the period, and decorative and 
utilitarian fountains, benches and seats were 
also common accessories. 




Henri IV in an Old French Garden 



The Evolution of French Gardens 21 

The old prints, which reproduced these early 
French gardens, are most curious to study, amus- 
ing even; but their point of view was often distorted 
as to perspective. In the thirteenth and four- 
teenth centuries, perspective was almost wholly 
ignored in pictorial records. There was often 
no scale, and no depth; everything was out of 
proportion with everything else, and for this 
reason it is difficult to judge of the exact pro- 
portions of many of these early French gardens. 

^he origin of garden-making in France, in 
the best accepted sense of the term, properly 
began with the later years of the thirteenth cen- 
tury and the early years of the fourteenth; con- 
tinuing the tradition, remained distinctly French 
until the mid-fifteenth century, for the Itahan 
influence did not begin to make itself felt until 
after the Italian wars and travels of Charles VIII, 
Louis XI and Francis I. 

The earliest traces of the work of the first 
two of these monarchs are to be seen at Blois 
and, for a time henceforth, it is to be presumed 
that all royal gardens in France were largely 
conceived under the inspiration of Itahan in- 
fluences. Before, as there were primitives in 
the art of painting in France, there were cer- 
tainly French gardeners in the fourteenth and 
fifteenth centuries. One of these, whoever he 



22 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

may have been, was the designer of the preaux 
and the treilles of the Louvre of Charles V, of 
which a pictorial record exists, and he, or they, 
did work of a Hke nature for the powerful house 
of Bourgogne, and for Rene d'Anjou, whom we 
know was a great amateur gardener. 

The archives of these princely houses often 
recount the expenses in detail, and so numerous 
are certain of them that it would not be difficult 
to picture anew as to just what they referred. 

Debanes, the gardener of the Chateau d' Angers, 
on a certain occasion, gave an accounting for 
*'X Sols'' for repairing the grass-plots and for 
making a petil preau. Again: "XI Sols" for 
the employ of six gardeners to trim the vines and 
clean up the alleys of the grand and petit jar din. 

Luxury in all things settled down upon all 
France to a greater degree than hitherto in the 
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and almost 
without exception princely houses set out to 
rival one another in the splendour of their sur- 
roundings. Now came in the ornamental garden 
as distinct from the verger, and the preau became 
a greensward accessory, at once practical and 
decorative, the precursor of the pelouse and the 
parterre of Le Notre. 

The preau (in old French prael) was a sym- 
metrical square or rectangular grass-grown gar- 



The Evolution of French Gardens 23 

den plot. From the Latin pratum, or pratellum, 
the words preau, pre and prairie were evolved 
naturally enough, and came thus early to be 
applied in France to that portion of the pleasure 
garden set out as a grassy lawn. The word is 
very ancient, and has come down to us through 
the monkish vocabulary of the cloister. 

Some celebrated verse of Christine de Pisan, 
who wrote "The Life of Charles V," thus de- 
scribes the cloister at Poissy. 

"Du cloistre grand large et especieux 
Que est carre, et, afin qu'il soit mieulx 
A un prael, ou milieu, gracieux 
Vert sans grappin 
Ou a plante en my un tres hault pin." 

It was at this period, that of Saint Louis and 
the apotheosis of Gothic architecture, that France 
was at the head of European civilization, there- 
fore in no way can her preeminence in garden- 
making be questioned. 

The gardens of the Gothic era seldom surpassed 
the enclos with a rivulet passing through it, a 
springs a pine tree giving a welcome shade, 
some simple flowers and a verger of fruit trees. 

The neighbours of France were often warring 
among themselves but the Grand Seigneur here 
was settling down to beautifying his surround- 



24 Ro yal Palaces and Parks of France 

ings and framing his chateaux, manors and 
country-seats in dignified and most appeaHng 
pictures. Grass-plots appeared in dooryards, 
flowers climbed up along castle walls and shrubs 
and trees came to play a genuinely esthetic role 
in the life of the times. 

An illustrious stranger, banished from Italy, 
one Brunetto Latini, the master of Dante, who 
had sought a refuge in France, wrote his views 
on the matter, which in substance were as above. 

About this time originated the progenitors of 
the glorietteSj which became so greatly the vogue 
in the eighteenth century. Practically the glori- 
ette, a word in common use in northern France 
and in Flanders, was a logette de plaisance. The 
Spaniards, too, in their glorietta, a pavilion in a 
garden, had practically the same signification 
of the word. 

In the fourteenth century French garden the 
gloriette was a sort of arbour, or trellis-like summer- 
house, garnished with vines and often perched 
upon a natural or artificial eminence. Other 
fast developing details of the French garden 
were tree-bordered alleys and the planting of 
more or less regularly set-out beds of flowering 
plants. 

Vine trellises and vine-clad pavilions and groves 
were a speedy development of these details, and 



The Evolution of French Gardens 25 

played parts of considerable importance in garden- 
ing under the French Renaissance. 

In this same connection there is a very precise 
record in an account of the gardens of the Louvre 
under Charles V concerning the contribution 
of one, Jean Baril, maker of Arlors, to this form 
of the landscape architect's art. 

"Ornamental birds — peacocks, pheasants and 
swans now came in as adjuncts to the French 
land and water garden." This was the way 
a certain pertinent comment was made by a 
writer of the fifteenth century. From the "Mena- 
gier de Paris," a work of the end of the four- 
teenth century, one learns that behind a dwelling 
of a prince or noble of the time was usually to 
be found a ^'beau jar din tout plante d'arhres 
a fruits, de legumes, de rosters, orne de volieres 
et tapise de gazon sur lesquels se promenent 
les paons^ 

French gardens of various epochs are readily 
distinguished by the width of their alleys. In 
the moyen-age the paths which separated the 
garden plots were very narrow; in the early 
Renaissance period they were somewhat wider, 
taking on a supreme maximum in the gardens 
of Le Notre. 

Trimmed trees entered into the general 
scheme in France towards the end of the fifteenth 



26 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



century. Under Henri IV and under Louis XII 
trees were often trimmed in ungainly, fantastic 
forms, but with the advent of Le Notre the good 
taste which he propagated so widely promptly 
rejected these grotesques, which, for a fact, 
were an importation from Flanders, like the 
gloriettes. Not by the remotest suggestion could 
a clipped yew in the form of a peacock or a giraffe 
be called French. Le Notre eliminated the 
menagerie and the aviary, but kept certain geo- 
metrical forms, particularly with respect to hedges, 
where niches were frequently trimmed out for 
the placing of statues, columns surmounted with 
golden balls, etc. 

The most famous of the frankly Renaissance 
gardens developed as a result of the migrations 
of the French monarchs in Italy were those 
surrounding such palaces and chateaux as Fon- 
tainebleau, Amboise, and Blois. Often these mani- 
festly French gardens, though of Italian in- 
spiration in the first instance, were actually the 
work of Italian craftsmen. Pucello Marceliano 
at four hundred livres and Edme Marceliano at 
two hundred livres were in the employ of Henri 11. 
It was the former who laid out the magnificent 
Parterre de Diane at Chenonceaux, where Cath- 
erine de Medici later, being smitten with the skill 
of the Florentines, gave the further commission 



The Evolution of French Gardens 27 



of the Jardin Vert, which was intended to com- 
plete this parterre, to Henri le Calabrese and 
Jean Collo. 

The later Renaissance gardens divided them- 
selves into various classes, jardins de plaisir, 
jar dins de plaisance, jardins de proprete, etc. 
Parterres now became of two sorts, parterres a 
compartiments and parterres de hroderies, names 
sufficiently explicit not to need further comment. 




^^ Parterre de Diane/' Chenonceaux 

It is difficult to determine just how garden 
broderies came into being. They may have been 
indirectly due to woman's love of embroidery 
and the garden alike. The making of these 
garden broderies was a highly cultivated art. 
Pierre Vallet, embroiderer to Henri IV, created 
much in his line of distinction and note, and 
acquired an extensive clientele for his flowers 
and models. Often these gardens, with their par- 



28 R oyal Palaces and Parks of France 

terres and hroderies were mere additions to an 
already existing architectural scheme, but with 
respect to the gardens of the Luxembourg and 
Saint Germain-en-Laye they came into being 
with the edifices themselves, or at least those 
portions which they were supposed to embellish. 
Harmony was then first struck between the works 
of the horticulturist — the garden-maker — and 
those of the architect — the builder in stone 
and wood. This was the prelude to those majes- 
tic ensembles of which Le Notre was to be the 
composer. 

Of the celebrated French palace and chateau 
gardens which are not centered upon the actual 
edifices with which they are more or less inti- 
mately connected, but are distinct and apart 
from the gardens which in most cases actually 
surround a dwelling, may be mentioned those 
of Montargis, Saint Germain, Amboise, Villers- 
Cotterets and Fontainebleau. These are rather 
parks, like the "home-parks," so called, in Eng- 
land, which, while adjuncts to the dwellings, 
are complete in themselves and are possessed 
of a separate identity, or reason for being. Chiefly 
these, and indeed most French gardens of the 
same epoch, differ greatly from contemporary 
works in Italy in that the latter were often built 
and terraced up and down the hillsides, whereas 



The Evolution of French Gardens 29 

the French garden was laid out, in the majority 
of instances, on the level, though each made 
use of interpolated architectural accessories such 
as balustrades, statuary, fountains, etc. 

Mollet was one of the most famous gardeners 
of the time of Louis XIV. He was the gardener 
of the Due d'Aumale, who built the gardens 
of the Chateau d'Anet while it was occupied by 
Diane de Poitiers, and for their time they were 
considered the most celebrated in France for their 
upkeep and the profusion and variety of their 
flowers. This was the highest development of 
the French garden up to this time. 

It is possible that this Claude Mollet was the 
creator of the parterres and hroderies so largely 
used in his time, and after. Mollet's formula 
was derived chiefly from flower and plant forms, 
resembling in design oriental embroideries. He 
made equal use of the labyrinth and the sunken 
garden. His idea was to develop the simple 
parquet into the elaborate parterre. He began 
his career under Henri III and ultimately be- 
came the gardener of Henri IV. His elaborate 
work '* Theatre des Plans et Jardinage" was 
written towards 1610-1612, but was only pub- 
lished a half a century later. It was only in the 
sixteenth century that gardens in Paris were 
planned and developed on a scale which was 



30 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



the equal of many which had previously been 
designed in the provinces. 

The chief names in French gardening — be- 
fore the days of Le Notre — were those of the 



Be§onia.. 

Gloire de 
touveciennei 
Blanc rose 



Be§onia 
. Vernon,,^ 
Roufc culvre 




Van 



'§radhs 
lurnineux 
Bose 

..3e§onio 
§raciKs 

Blanc 

Echelte: 

il I I f I 



ELaAN of SUJSTKEISt GA'RlDEt^ (C/'^Si^IJV CR^Z/pC) 



two Mollets, the brothers Boyceau, de la Barau- 
derie and Jacques de Menours, and all suc- 
cessively held the post of Superintendent of the 
Garden of the King. 
In these royal gardens there was always a 



The Evolution of French Gardens 31 

distinctly notable feature, the grand roiales, the 
principal avenues, or alleys, which were here 
found on a more ambitious scale than in any of 
the private gardens of the nobility. The central 
avenue was always of the most generous pro- 
portions, the nomenclature coming from royal 
— the grand ratal being the equivalent of Allee 
Roy ale, that is, Avenue Royal. 

By the end of the sixteenth century the Gar- 
den of the Tuileries, which was later to be entirely 
transformed by Le Notre, offered an interesting 
aspect of the parquet at its best. In ^^ Paris a 
Tr avers les Ages^^ one reads that from the win- 
dows of the palace the garden resembled a great 
checker-board containing more than a hundred 
uniform carreaux. There were six wide longi- 
tudinal alleys or avenues cut across by eight or 
ten smaller alleys which produced this rectangular 
effect. Within some of the squares were single, 
or grouped trees; in others the conventional 
quincunx; others were mere expanses of lawn, 
and still others had flowers arranged in sym- 
metrical patterns. In one of these squares was 
a design which showed the escutcheons of the 
arms of France and those of the Medici. These 
gardens of the Tuileries were first modified by 
a project of Bernard Palissy, the porcelainiste. 
He let his fancy have full sway and the criss- 



32 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



cross alleys and avenues were set out at their 
junctures with moulded ornaments, enamelled 
miniatures, turtles in faience and frogs in porce- 
lain. It was this, perhaps, which gave the im- 
petus to the French for their fondness to-day 
for similar effects, but Bernard Pahssy doubtless 
never went so far as plaster cats on a ridgepole, 
as one may see to-day on many a pretty villa in 
northern France. This certainly lent an element 
of picturesqueness to the Renaissance Garden 
of the Louvre, a development of the same spirit 
which inspired this artist in his collaboration 
at Chenonceaux. This was the formula which 
produced the jardin delectable, an exaggeration 
of the taste of the epoch, but still critical of its 
time. 

The gardens of the Renaissance readily divided 
themselves into two classes, those of the par- 
terres a compartiments and those of the parterres 
de hroderies. The former, under Francis I and 
Henri II, were divided into geometrical com- 
partments thoroughly in the taste of the Renais- 
sance, but bordered frequently with representa- 
tions of designs taken from Venetian lace and 
various other contemporary stuffs. There were 
other parterres, where the compartments were 
planned on a more utilitarian scale; in other 
words, they were the potagers which rendered 




<^ 






The Evolution of French Gardens 33 

the garden, said Olivier de Serres, one of "prof- 
itable beauty." Some of the compartments were 
devoted entirely to herbs and medicinal plants 
v^hile others were entirely given over to flowers. 
In general the compartments were renewed twice 
a year, in May and August. 

The Grand Parterre at Fontainebleau, called 
in other days the Parterre de Tiber, offered as 
remarkable an example of the terrace garden 
as was to be found in France, the terraces rising 
a metre or more above the actual garden plot 
and enclosing a sort of horticultural arena. 

It was in the sixteenth century that architec- 
tural motives came to be incorporated into the 
gardens in the form of square, round or octagonal 
pavilions, and here and there were added con- 
siderable areas of tiled pavements, features which 
were found at their best in the gardens of the 
Chateau de Gaillon and at Langeais. 

One special and distinct feature of the French 
Renaissance garden was the labyrinth, of which 
three forms were known. The first was com- 
posed of merely low borders, the second of hedges 
shoulder high, or even taller, and the third was 
practically a roofed-over grove. The latter in- 
vention was due, it is said, to the discreet 
Louis XIV. In the Tuileries garden, in the time 
of Catherine de Medici, there was a labyrinth 



34 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



greatly in vogue with the Parisian nobles who 
"found much pleasure in amusing themselves 
therein." 

In that garden the labyrinth was sometimes 
called the "Road of Jerusalem" and it was pre- 
sumably of eastern origin. 

Jn the seventeenth century grottos came to 
be added to the garden, though this is seemingly 
an Italian tradition of much earlier date. Among 
the notable grottos of this time were that of the 
Jar din des Pins at Fontainebleau, and that of 
the Chateau de Meudon, built by Philibert De- 
lorme, of which Ronsard celebrated its beauties 
in verse. The art was not confined to the gar- 
dens of royalties and the nobility, for the bour- 
geoisie speedily took up with the puerile idea 
(said to have come from Holland, by the way), 
and built themselves grottos of shells, plaster 
and boulders. It was then that the chiens de 
faience, which the smug Paris suburbanite of 
to-day so loves, were born. 

^By the seventeenth century the equalized 
carreaux of the early geometrically disposed 
gardens were often replaced with the oblongs, 
circles and, somewhat timidly introduced, more 
bizarre forms, the idea being to give variety to 
the ensemble. There was less fear for the artis- 
tic effect of great open spaces than had formerly 



The Evolution of French Gardens 35 

existed, and the avenues and alleys were con- 
siderably enlarged, and such architectural and 
sculptural accessories as fountains, balustrades 
and perrons were designed on a more extensive 
scale. Basins and canals and other restrained 
surfaces of water began to appear on a larger 
scale, and greater insistence was put upon their 
proportions with regard to the decorative part 
which they were to play in the ensemble. 

This was the preparatory period of the coming 
into being of the works of Le Notre and Mansart. 

The Grand Steele lent a profound majesty to 
royal and noble dwellings, and its effect is no 
less to be remarked upon than the character of 
their gardens. The moving spirit which or- 
dained all these things was the will of the Roi 
Soleil. 

Parterres and hroderies were designed on even 
a grander scale than before. They were fre- 
quently grouped into four equal parts with a 
circular basin in the centre, and mirror-like basins 
of water sprang up on all sides. 

\ Close to the royal dwelling was the fore-court, 
as often dressed out with flowers and lawn as 
with tiles and flags. From it radiated long alleys 
and avenues, stretching out almost to infinity. 
At this time the grass-plots were developed to 
high order, and there were groves, rest-houses. 



36 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



bowers, and theatres de verdure at each turning. 
Tennis-courts came to be a regularly installed 
accessory, and the basins and "mirrors" of 
water were frequently supplemented by cascades, 
and some of the canals were so large that barges 
of state floated thereon. Over some of the canals 
bridges were built as fantastic in design as those 
of the Japanese, and again others as monumental 
as the Pont Neuf. 

._Jn their majestic regularity the French gar- 
dens of the seventeenth century possessed an 
admirable solemnity, albeit their amplitude and 
majesty give rise to justifiable criticism. It is 
this criticism that qualifies the values of such 
gardens as those of Versailles and Vaux, but one 
must admit that the scale on which they were 
planned has much to do with this, and cer- 
tainly if they had been attached to less majestic 
edifices the comment would have been even more 
justifiable. As it is, the criticism must be quahfied. 
The aspect of the garden by this time 
had been greatly modified. Aside from such 
great ensembles as those of Versailles was now 
to be considered a taste for something smaller, 
but often overcrowded with accessories of the 
same nature, which compared so well with the 
vastness of Versailles, but which, on the other 
hand, looked so out of place in miniature. 



The Evolution of French Gardens 37 

It was not long now before the "style pom- 
padour'' began to make itself shown with regard 
to garden design — the exaggeration of an un- 
deniable grace by an affected mannerism. All 
the rococco details which had been applied to 
architecture now began to find their duplication 
in the garden rockeries — weird fantasies built 
of plaster and even shells of the sea. 

By later years of the eighteenth century there 
came on the scene as a designer of gardens one, 
De Neufforge. His work was a prelude to the clas- 
sicism of the style of Louis XVI which was to 
come. There was, too, at this time a disposition 
towards the English garden, but only a slight 
tendency, though towards 1780 the conventional 
French garden had been practically abandoned. 
The revolution in the art of garden-making 
therefore preceded that of the world of politics 
by some years. 

^ There are three or four works which give 
specific details on these questions. They are 
*'Z>e la Distribution des Maisons de Plaisance,^^ 
by Blondel (1773), his ^^Cours d'^ Architecture^^ 
of the same date, and Panseron's volume entitled 
^^Recueil de Jardinage,^^ published in 1783. 

yThe following brief resume shows the various 
steps through which the French formal garden 
passed. In the moyen-age the garden was a thing 



38 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

quite apart from the dwelling, and was but a 
diminutive dooryard sort of a garden. The gar- 
den of the Renaissance amplified the regular lines 
which existed in the moyen-age, but was often 
quite as little in accord with the dwelling that 
it surrounded as its predecessor. 

The union of the garden and the dwelling 
and its dependencies was clearly marked under 
Louis XIV, while the gardens of Louis XV tended 
somewhat to modify the grand lines and the majes- 
tic presence of those of his elder. These gardens 
of Louis XV were more fantastic, and followed 
less the lines of traditional good taste. Shapes 
and forms were complicated and indeed inex- 
plicably mixed into a melange that one could 
hardly recognize for one thing or another, cer- 
tainly not as examples of any well-meaning styles 
which have lasted until to-day. The straight 
line now disappeared in favour of the most dis- 
solute and irrational curves imaginable, and the 
sober majesty of the gardens of Louis XIV be- 
came a tangle of warring elements, fine in parts 
and not uninteresting, effective, even, here and 
there, but as a whole an aggravation. 

Finally the reaction came for something more 
simple and more in harmony with rational taste. 

Jhe best example remaining of the Louis XV 
garden is that which surrounds the Pavilion de 



The Evolution of French Gardens 39 

Musique of the Petit Trianon, an addition to 
the garden which Louis XIV had given to the 
Grand Trianono By comparison with the big 
garden of Le Notre this latter conception is as 
a boudoir to a reception hall. 

The garden of Louis XVI was a composite, 
with interpolations from across the Rhine, from 
Holland and Belgium and from England even; 
features which got no great hold, however, but 
which, for a time, gave it an air less French than 
anything which had gone before. 
^From the beginning of the nineteenth century 
the formal garden was practically abandoned 
in France. It was the period of the real deca- 
dence of the formal garden. This came not from 
one cause alone but from many. To the straight 
lines and gentle curves of former generations 
upon generations of French gardens were added 
sinuosities as varied and complicated as those 
of the Vale of Cashmere, and again, with tiny 
stars and crescents and what not, the ground 
resembled an ornamental ceiling more than it 
did a garden. The sentimentalism of the epoch 
did its part, and accentuated the desire to carry 
out personal tastes rather than build on tradi- 
tionally accepted hnes. The taste for the English 
garden grew apace in France, and many a noble 
plantation was remodelled on these lines, or 



40 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



rooted up altogether. Immediately neighbour- 
ing upon the dwelling the garden still bore some 
resemblance to its former outlines, but, as it 
drew farther away, it became a park, a wildwood 
or a preserve. 

Isabey Pere, a miniaturist, under Napoleonic 
stimulus, designed a number of French gardens 
in the early years of the nineteenth century, 
following more or less the conventional lines of 
the best work of the seventeenth century, and 
succeeded admirably in a small way in resuscita- 
ting the fallen taste. Isabey's gardens may have 
lacked much that was remarkable in the best 
work of Le Notre, but they were considerably 
better than anything of a similar nature, so far 
as indicating a commendable desire to return 
to better ideals. 

Under the Second Empire a great impulse 
was given to garden design and making in Paris 
itself. It was then that the parks and squares 
came really to enter into the artistic conception 
of what a city beautiful should be. 

Leaving the gardens of the Tuileries and the 
Luxembourg out of the question, the Pare Mon- 
ceau and that of the Buttes Chaumont of to-day, 
the descendants of these first Paris gardens show 
plainly how thoroughly good they were in design 
and execution. 




The Evolution of French Gardens 41 

The majority of professional gardeners of re- 
nown in France made their first successes with 
the gardens of the city of Paris, reproducing the 
best of the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth 
century work, which had endured without the 
competition of later years having dulled its beauty, 
though perhaps the parterres of to-day are rather 
more warm in colouring, even cruder, than those 
of a former time. 

The jardin fleuriste and the parterre horticole 
of the nineteenth century appealed however 
quite as much in their general arrangement 
and the modification of their details and their 
rainbow colours, as any since the time of Louis 
XVI. According to the expert definition the jar- 
din fleuriste was a ''garden reserved exclusively to 
the culture and ornamental disposition of plants 
giving forth rich leaves and beautiful flowers." 
The above quoted description is decidedly apt. 
The seventeenth century French garden formed 
a superb framing for the animated fetes and 
reunions in which took part such a brilliant 
array of lords and ladies of the court as may 
have been invited to taste the delicacies of a 
fete amid such luxurious appointments. 

vThe fashionable and courtly life of the day, 
so far as its open-air aspect was concerned, cen- 
tered around these gardens and parks of the 



42 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

great houses of royalty and the nobility. The 
costume of the folk of the time, with cloak and 
sword and robes of silk and velvet and gilded 
carriages and chaises-a-porteurs, had little in 
common with the out-of-door garden-party life 
of to-day, where the guests arrive in automo- 
biles, be-rugged and be-goggled and somewhat 
the worse for a dusty journey. It is for this 
reason that Versailles and Vaux-le-Vicomte, in 
spite of the suggestion of sumptuousness which 
they still retain, are, from all points of view, 
more or less out of scale with the life of our times. 
The modern garden, whether laid out in reg- 
ular hues, or on an ornamental scale, as a flower 
garden purely, or in a composite style, is usually 
but an adjunct to the modern chateau, villa or 
cottage. It is more intimate than the vast, 
more theatrically disposed area of old, and is 
more nearly an indication of the personal tastes 
of the owner because of its restrained propor- 
tions. 



! ■ 







Bassin de la Couronne, Vaux-le-Vicomte 



CHAPTER III 

THE ROYAL HUNT IN FRANCE 

Just how great a part the royal hunt played 
in the open-air life of the French court all who 
know their French history and have any familiar- 
ity with the great forests of France well recog- 
nize. 

The echo of French country architecture as 
evinced in the '^maisons de plaismice^^ and ^^ren- 
dezvous de chasse^^ scattered up and down the 
France of monarchial times lives until to-day, 
scarcely fainter than when the note was originally 
sounded. Often these establishments were some- 
thing more than a mere hunting-lodge, or 
shooting-box, indeed they generally aspired to 
the proportions of what may readily be accepted 
as a country-house. They established a specious 
type of architecture which in many cases grew, 
in later years, into a chateau or palace of mani- 
festly magnificent appointments. 

At the great hunting exposition recently held 
at Vienna the clou of the display was a French 
royal hunting-lodge in the style of Louis XVI, 

43 



44 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



hung with veritable Gobelin tapestries, loaned 
by the French government and picturing "The 
Hunt in France." It v^as called by the critics 
a unique painting in a beautiful frame. 

In the days of Francis I and his sons, the 
royal hunt was given a great impetus by Catherine 
de Medici, wife of Henri II. 

Francis, in company with his sons, had gone 
to Marseilles to meet the Medici bride, who 
was on her way to make her home at the Paris 
Louvre, and when he found her possessed of so 
lively manners and such great intelligence he 
became so charmed with her that, it is said, he 
danced with her all of the first evening. What 
pleased the monarch even more, and perhaps 
not less his sons, was that she shot with an arque- 
buse like a sharpshooter, and could ride to 
hounds like a natural-born Amazon. She was 
more than a rival, as it afterwards proved, of 
that arch-huntress, Diane de Poitiers. 

History recounts in detail that last royal hunt 
of Francis I at Rambouillet, when he was lying 
near to death, the guest of his old friend, d'An- 
gennes. 

The old manor, half hunting-lodge, half for- 
tress, and very nearly royal in all its appointments, 
proved a comfortable enough rest-house, and 
on the day after his arrival, in March, 1547, the 



The Royal Hunt in France 45 

monarch commanded the preparations for a 
royal hunt to commence at daybreak in the 
neighbouring forest. 

• The equipage started forth in full ceremonial 
on the quest of stag and boar. The bugles blew 
and a sort of stimulated courage once more 
entered the king's breast, courage born of the 
excitement around him, the baying of the hounds 
and the tramping and neighing of impatient 
horses. He had forced himself from his bed 
and on horseback and started off with the rest, 
defying the better counsel of his retainers. 

tHis strength proved to be born of a fictitious 
enthusiasm, and, speedily losing interest, he was 
brought back to the manor where he had his 
apartments, and put speechless and half dead 
to bed, actually dying the next day from this 
last over-exertion, scarce half a century of the 
span of his life accomplished. 

, Henri de Navarre also was a true lover of the 
open. Born in a mountain town in the Pyrenees 
he would rather camp on a bed of pine needles 
in the forest than lie on a tuft of down. He 
preferred his beloved Bayonne ham, spiced with 
garlic, to a sumptuous dinner in Jarnet house, 
a famous Paris tavern of the day; and had rather 
quench his thirst with a quaff of the wine of 
Juran^on than the finest cru in Paris cellars. 



46 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



He hated the parade of courts, was dirty, 
unkempt and careless, a genuine son of the soil, 
heedless of fate, and an excellent huntsman. 

Up to the seventeenth century the ladies of 
the French court showed a keener interest for 
falconry than for the hunt by horse and hounds. 

The heroines of the Fronde, and the genera- 
tion which followed, seemed to lose interest in 
this form of sport, and gave their favour to packs 
of hounds, and followed with equal interest the 
hunt for deer, wolves, boars, foxes and hares 
as they were tracked through forests and over 
arid wastes. 

The old hunting horn, the winding horn of 
romance, still exists at the hunts of France, 
a relic of the days of Louis XIV. It sounds 
the conventional comings and goings of the hunts- 
men in the same classic phraseology as of old 
— the lancer, the hien allee, the vue, the ckange- 
ment de foret, the accompagne, the hat Peau, the 
hallali par terre, and the curee. 

The ^^ Curee aux Flambeaux^* was one of the 
most picturesque ceremonies connected with the 
royal hunt in France. It began in the gallant 
days, and lived even until the time of the Second 
Empire. 

The curee, that is the giving up to the hounds 
the remains of an animal slain in chase, does 




A '^ Curee aux Flauiheaux 



The Royal Hunt in France 47 

not always take place at night, but when it does 
the torches play the part of impressive and pic- 
turesque accessories. When a curee takes place 
at the spot where the animal is actually killed 
the French sporting term for the ceremony is 
''force et abattu.^^ This, however, is usually pre- 
ceded by another called ''/e pied,^^ which con- 
sists in cutting off one of the feet of the dead 
animal and offering it to the person in whose 
honor the hunt was held. 

■When the curee takes place by torchlight the 
body of the animal is carried beneath the win- 
dows of the chateau, a circle is formed by the 
'^ piqueurs,^^ or head hunters, and all who have 
participated in the pursuit; and, to the sound 
of a trumpet, loaned by the sportsmen, one of 
the valets de venerie cuts up the stag. The 
meuteSy that is to say, the hounds which are let 
slip last of all, and which terminates the chase 
— are then brought by the valet des chiens, who 
has great difficulty in keeping them from break- 
ing loose. When the entrails have been cut 
away the valet sits astride the animal, holding 
up the nappe, or head and neck, shaking it at 
the already furious hounds. It is the care of the 
valet during this interval to conceal the pieces 
of flesh which are still under the body. The 
hounds are then loosened, but are kept within 



48 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

bounds by the whips of the piqueurs and the 
valet des chiens. When the dogs are sufficiently 
exasperated the brutes are allowed to rush upon 
the remains of their victim; only, however, to 
be driven back again by whipping. When their 
docility has thus been proven the definite signal, 
''lachez tout,'' is given, and the hounds rush 
towards the stag. 

The curee then presents a savage spectacle: 
the air is filled with growling, barking and yell- 
ing, while the ground is covered with scrambling 
dogs, their mouths reeking with blood. 

The feminine costume for the hunt in the 
time of Louis XIII was of broadcloth or velvet, 
with a great feather-ornamented ^^ picture" hat. 
Only now and again a lady on horseback after 
1650 dared borrow doublet and jacket, and 
mount astride. 

The ladies followed the hunt of Louis XIV 
on horseback, seldom, if ever, in the older manner 
of sitting behind their cavalier on the same steed. 
I From the time of Catherine de Medici, indeed, 
the Italian side-saddle had become the fashion 
for women. 

Under Louis XV the ladies sought a little 
more comfort, apd followed the equipage sitting 
in a sort of hamper-like, diminutive basket, 
hung from the broad back of a sturdy quadruped. 



The Royal Hunt in France 49 

Dresses became more fanciful, both in materials 
and colours. From this it was but a step to even 
more elaborate toilettes which necessitated a 
conveyance of some sort on wheels, but the most 
intrepid still clung to the traditionally classic 
methods. Marie Antoinette had her equipage 
de chassej and Madame Durfort was constantly 
abroad in the forests of Montmorency and Boissy, 
directing the operation of eight or ten profes- 
sional huntsmen. Among her guests were fre- 
quently the ambassadors of Prussia, Russia 
and Austria. 

In the time of Louis XIV the Comtesse de 
Lude devoted herself to the hunt with a frenzy 
born of an inordinate enthusiasm. At the head 
of a pack of hounds she knew no obstacle, and, on 
one occasion, penetrated on horseback, followed 
by her dogs, into the oratory of the nuns of the 
Convent of Estival. 

By the end of the seventeenth century the hunt 
in France had become no more a sport for ladies. 
Hunting was still a noble sport, but it was more 
for men than for women. The court hunted 
not only in royal company, but accepted in- 
vitations from any seigneur who possessed an 
ample preserve and who could put up a good 
kill; magistrates, financiers and bishops, indeed 
all classes, became followers of the hunt. 



50 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

Montgaillard tells of a hunt in which he took 
part on the feast day of Saint Bernard, with 
the monks of the Bernardin Convent in Langue- 
doc. In the episcopal domain of Saverne six 
hundred beaters were employed on one occasion 
to provide sport for an assembled company of 
lords and ladies. These were the days when 
the bishops were in truth Grand Seigneurs. 

vThe women of the court, while they played 
the game, ceded nothing to the men in bravery. 
Neither rain, hail nor snow frightened them. 
On the 28th of June, 1713, Louis XIV was hunt- 
ing the deer at Rambouillet when a terrific, 
cyclonic storm fell upon the equipage, but not 
a man nor woman in the monarch's party quit. 
The Duchesse de Berry was "wet to the skin," 
but her ardour for the hunt was not in the least 
cooled. 

\ To-day at Fontainebleau or Rambouillet the 
echo is sounded from the hunting horn of La- 
baudy, the sugar-king, who pulls off at least 
two ''hunts," with his spectacular equipage, 
each year, and it is a sight too; a French hunting 
party was ever picturesque, and if to-day not 
as practical as the more blood-loving English- 
man's hunt, is at least traditionally sentimental, 
even artificial to the extent, at any rate, that it 
seems stagy, even to the inclusion of the auto- 
mobiles which bring and carry away the partici- 



The Royal Hunt in Prance 51 

pants. ^' Other days, other ways "never had a 
more strict application than to la chasse a courre 
in France. 

Two accounts are here given of two com- 
paratively modern figures in the French hunting 
field, which show the great store set by the sport 
in France. 

In the annals of the Chateau de Grosbois, 
belonging to-day to the Prince de Wagram, are 
the accounts of an early nineteenth century hunt, 
which shows that the game cost dear. The 
"Grand Veneur" of the Napoleonic reign was 
a master sportsman, indeed, and to-day, in a 
gallery of the chateau, are preserved the guns of 
the master, his hunting crop and saddle, his 
"colours" and his hunting horn. 

From the registers of the chateau, under date 
of December lo, 1809, the following, which con- 
cerned a hunting party given by the chatelain, 
is extracted verbatim. 
Note of the Maitre d'Hotel for colla- 
tions for the guests 8,226 francs 

Illuminations 1,080 francs 

Gratifications to the beaters 1,000 francs 

Eau de Cologne for the ladies . . 30 francs 

Gun-bearers 148 francs 

Helpers (150) 600 francs 

Aids (200) 315 francs 



52 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Another hunt was given in 1811, in honour of 
Napoleon, when such items as three thousand 
francs for an orchestra, a hke sum for bouquets 
for the ladies, a thousand or two for bonbons 
and fans, and twelve thousand for hired furni- 
ture, etc., to say nothing of the expenses of the 
hunt itself, made the bag somewhat costly. It 
was not always easy for the master of the hunt 
to get justice when it came to paying for his sup- 
plies, and in these same records a mention of a 
dozen leather breeches at a hundred and forty 
francs each was crossed off and a marginal note, 
NoUj added in the hand of Marechal Berthier, 
Prince de Wagram, himself. 

The chief figure in the French hunting world 
of' to-day is another descendant of the Napo- 
leonic portrait gallery. Prince Murat. At the 
age of twelve the young Prince Joachim had 
already followed the hounds at Fontainebleau 
and Compiegne. In his double quality of rela- 
tive and companion of the Prince Imperial he 
was one of the chiefs of the equipment of the Im- 
perial Hunt. To-day, though well past the span 
of life, he is as active and as enduring in his 
participation in the strenuous sport as many a 
younger man and his knowledge of the grand 
art of venerie-y and his ardour for being always 
ahead with the hounds, is noted by all who may 



n^ *^^r".- /~V^' * - -n _ v.''- 



1 



4n frhteriai Hunt ai Fontainehleau 




3 and Parks of France 

u..,,i - .c nyQYi in (8iij in honour of 

. i items as three thousand 

. stra, a like sum for bouquets 

^liousand or two for bonbons 

ive thousand for hired furni- 

ofhinrr o^ the expenses of the 

omewhat costly. It 

master of the hunt 

it came to paying for his sup- 

' se same records a mention of a 

.1 hundred and forty 

francs eac crossed oil and a marginal note, 

Non, aHd- the hand of Marechai Berthier, 

Pri; im, himself. 

:-<jay IS another descendant of the Napo- 

nrailery. Prince Murat. At the 

he young Prince Joachim had 

•ed the hounds at Fontainebleau 

a his double quality of rela- 

uon of the Prince Imperial he 

the chiefs of the equipment of the Im- 

i Hui vday, though well past the span 

di active and as enduring in his 

in the strenuous sport as many a 

'}(1 his knowledge of the grand 

rid his ardour for being always 

axiuuu wiUi UiC iiounds, is noted by all who may 



The Royal Hunt in France 53 

happen to see him while jaunting through the 
Foret de Compiegne, keeping well up with the 
traditions of his worthy elder, the "Premier 
Cavalier'* of the First Empire, the King of Naples. 

He won his first stripes in the hunting field 
at Compiegne in 1868, at a hunt given in honour 
of the Prince de Hohenzollern and the Princesse, 
who was the sister of the King of Portugal. It 
was a most moving event, so much so that it just 
escaped being turned into a drama, for one of 
the ladies of the court had a leg broken, and the 
minister, Fould, was almost mortally injured. 
A ^^dix cors,^^ a stag with antlers of ten branches, 
had been run down at the Rond Royal where it 
had taken refuge in a near-by copse, and after 
an hour's hard chase was finally cornered in 
the courtyard of some farm buildings of the 
Hameau d'Orillets. A troop of cows was en- 
tering the courtyard at the same moment, and a 
most confused melee ensued. The Inspector 
of Forests saved the situation and the cows 
of the farmer, and the stag fell to the carabine 
of Prince de la Moskowa, with the young Prince 
Murat on his pony in the very front rank. 

Thus early initiated in the chivalrous sport 
of the hunt the young man followed every hunt, 
big or little, which was held in the environs of 
Paris for many years, and by the time that he 



54 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

came to possess the epaulettes of an Officier de 
Cuirassiers he was known to all the hunts from 
the Ardennes to Anjou. 

For the past generation he has been retired 
to civil life by a Republican decree, and since 
that time has lived in his suburban Paris prop- 
erty, devoting himself to the raising of hunters. 
Here he lives almost on the borders of that great 
extent of forest which occupies the northern 
section of the He de France, occasionally organiz- 
ing a hunt, which takes on not a little of the noble 
aspect of a former time, the prince following 
always within sound of the hunting horn and the 
baying of the hounds, if not actually always 
within sight of the quarry. 

lit is here, in his Villa Normande, near which 
Saint Ouen gave Dagobert that famous counsel 
which has gone down in history, that the Prince 
and Princesse Murat come to pass two or three 
months each year with their children, their al- 
lied parents and the "great guns" of the old 
regime who still gather about the master of the 
hunt as courtiers gather around their king. 

At Chamblay there have been held magnificent 
gun shoots under the organization of the prince 
and his equipage. His kennels contain forty- 
eight of the finest bred hounds in France, and 
are guarded by three care-takers, the goader, 



The Royal Hunt in France 55 

Carl, whose fame has reached every hunting 
court of Europe and a couple of valets des chiens. 
The prince's colours are distributed as follows: 
a huzzar jacket of blue, with collar, plaquettes, 
and vest of grenadine and breeches of a darker 
blue. 

Formerly Prince Murat hunted the roe-deer 
in the valley of the Oise, but many enclosures 
of private property having made this exceedingly 
difficult in later years he is to-day obliged to 
go farther afield. In the spring the equipage 
goes to Rosny, near Mantes, and perhaps during 
the same season occasionally to Rambouillet. 

The hunts at Chamblay are the perfection of 
the practice of the art. Seldom, is the quarry 
wanting. The refrain of the Ode to Saint Hubert 
lauds the prowess of this great "Maitre d'Equi- 
page." 

" Par Saint Hubert mon patron 
C'est quel que due de haut renom 

Sonnez : ecuyers et piqueux 
Un Murat vien en ces lieux." 

Chamblay fortunately being neither populous 
nor near a great town there is no throng of curi- 
ous spectators hovering about to get in the way 
and scare the game and the hounds and their 
followers out of their wits. The Chasse de 



56 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Chamblay is the devotion of the vrais veneurs; 
the Prince Murat and his son, the Prince Joachim, 
(to-day at the military school at Saint Cyr), the 
Prince Eugene Murat, the Comte de Vallon, 
the Baron de Neuflize and a few famous veneurs 
in gay uniforms come from afar to give eclat 
to the hunt of the master. And the ladies: 
the following names are of those devoted to the 
prowess of the Prince Murat — Madame la Prin- 
cesse, la Princesse Marguerite Murat, Mademoi- 
selle d'Elchingen, the Duchesse and the Mar- 
quise d'Albufera, the Duchesse de Camestra, 
and Madame ICraft. 

From this one sees that romance is not all 
smouldering. If other proof were wanting a 
perusal of that most complete and interesting 
account of the hunt in France in modern times, 
^^Les Chasses de RambouilleV (Ouvrage offert 
far Monsieur Felix Faure) would soon establish 
it. This was not a work destined for the public 
at large. The hunt was ever a sport of kings 
in France, and though France has become Re- 
publican its Chasse Nationale at Rambouillet 
partakes not a little of the aspect of those courtly 
days when there was less up-to-dateness and 
more sentiment. 

There were but one hundred copies of this 
work printed for the friends of the late president 



The Royal Hunt in France 57 

of the Republic — ''Other Sovereigns," as the 
dedication reads, "Princes, Grand Dukes, Am- 
bassadors." 

Rambouillet was the theatre of the most splendid 
hunts of the sixteenth century, and down through 
the ages it has ever held a preeminent place; 
holds it to-day even. Louis XVI in the Rev- 
olutionary torment even regretted the cutting 
off of his prerogative of the royal hunt, but 
he had no choice in the matter. In his journal 
of 1789 one reads: "the cerf runs alone in the 
Pare en Bas" (Rambouillet), and again in 
1790: "Seance of the National Assembly at 
noon; Audience of a deputation in the afternoon. 
The deer plentiful at Gambayseuil. " 

The Revolution felled many French institu- 
tions; low, great, ecclesiastical and monarchial 
monuments, the trees of the forest, and the royal 
game, by a system of poaching, had become 
greatly diminished in quantity. 

The nineteenth century, so frankly democratic 
in its latter years, was less favourable to the 
hunt than the monarchial days which had gone 
before. It had a considerable prominence under 
Charles X, more perhaps than it ever had under 
Napoleon, who in his infancy and laborious 
adolescence had few opportunities of following 
it ; and in the later years of his life he was too busy. 



58 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Napoleon III was not really a *^good hunter,'' 
though he was something of a marksman and 
took a considerable pride in his skill in that 
accomplishment. 

Entering the democratic era, Jules Grevy 
seems to have been only a pot-hunter of the 
bourgeoisie, who practiced the art only because 
he wanted a jugged hare for his dinner, or again 
simply to kill time. 

Sadi-Carnot was still less a hunter of the ro- 
mantic school, but assisted frequently at the 
ceremonial shootings which were arranged for 
visiting monarchs. On one occasion he was 
put down on the record-sheet of a hunt at Ram- 
bouillet as responsible only for the death of 
eighteen heads, whilst a visiting Grand Duke 
pulled down a hundred and fifty. 
\ It was notably during the presidency of Felix 
Faure that Rambouillet again took on its ani- 
mation of former times. The chateau had 
been furbished up once more after a long sleep, 
and, to the great satisfaction of the inhabitants 
of the town, there were more comings and goings 
than there had been for a quarter of a century. 

In the summer and autumn the president 
made Rambouillet his preferred residence, and 
there received many visiting sovereigns and 
notables of all ranks. In one year a score 



The Royal Hunt in France 59 

of ''Official Hunts" were held, to which all the 
members of the diplomatic corps were invited, 
while there were two or three affairs of an ''In- 
ternational" character in honour of visiting sov- 
ereigns. 

All was under the control of the Grand Veneur 
of the Third Republic, the Comte de Girardin, 
and while a truly royal flavour may have been 
lacking the general aspect was much the same 
as it might have been in the days of the monarchy. 
The Captain of the Hunt under Felix Faure 
was the Inspector of Forests, Leddet, and the 
Premier Veneur was the Commandant Lagarenne. 
' The president himself was a marksman of 
the first rank, and never w^as there a reckoning 
up of the tableau but that he was near the head 
of the list. So accomplished was he with the 
rifle that on more than one occasion he was obliged 
to practically efface himself in favour of some 
visiting monarch, as it was said he did in the 
case of the King of Portugal in 1895, the Grand 
Dues Vladimir and Nicolas in 1896. 

Huntsmen not royal by virtue of title, or al- 
liance, the Republican president beat to a stand- 
still. He had no pity nor favour for a mere am- 
bassador, whether he hailed from England or 
Germany, nor for members of the Institute, 
Senators nor Deputies. With Prince Albert of 



60 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Monaco he held himself equal, and for every 
bird shot on the wing by the head of the house 
of Grimaldi the "longshoreman" of Havre 
brought down another. 

La chasse a courre before the law in France 
to-day may be practiced only under strictly 
laid down conditions. The huntsman must le- 
gally have his dogs under such control, and keep 
sufficiently close to them, as to be able to recover 
the quarry immediately after it has been closed 
in upon by the hounds. 

Like shooting, since the Decree of 1844, hunt- 
ing with hounds may only be undertaken under 
authority of a permis de chasse, and in open 
season, during the daytime, and with the consent 
of the owners over whose properties the hunt 
is to be held. 

The ceremony of the hunt in France now fol- 
lows the traditions of the classic hunt of the 
monarchy. The veneur decides on the rendez- 
vous, whether the quarry be stag or chevreuil, 
fox or hare. The piqueur follows close up with 
the dogs, sets them on or calls them off, and re- 
calls them if they go off on a false scent. 



CHAPTER ivy 

THE PALAIS DE LA CITE AND TOURNELLES 

Not every one assumes the Paris Palais de 
Justice to ever have been the home of kings and 
queens. It has not, however, always been a tilt- 
ing ground for lawyers and criminals, though, 
no doubt, when one comes to think of it, it is 
in that role that it has acted its most thrilling 
episodes. 

The Saint Chapelle, the Conciergerie and 
the great clock of the Tour de THorloge mark 
the Palais de Justice down in the books of most 
folk as one of the chief Paris "sights," but it 
was as a royal residence that it first came into 
prominence. 

This palace, not the conglomerate half-secular, 
half-religious pile of to-day, but an edifice of 
some considerable importance, existed from the 
earliest days of the Frankish invasion, and 
when occupied by Clotilde, the wife of Clovis, 
was known as the Palais de la Cite. 

Under the last of the kings of the First Race 
this palace took on really splendid proportions. 

61 



62 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

When Hugues Capet arrived on the throne he 
abandoned the kingly residence formerly oc- 
cupied by the Frankish rulers, the Palais des 
Thermes, and installed his goods and chattels 
in this Palais de la Cite, which his son Robert 
had rebuilt under the direction of Enguerrand 
de Marigny. 

Up to the time of Francis I it remained the 
preferred residence of the French monarchs, 
regardless of the grander, more luxuriously dis- 
posed Louvre, which had come into being. 

Philippe Auguste, by a contrary caprice, would 
transact no kingly business elsewhere, and it 
was within the walls of this palace that he mar- 
ried Denmark's daughter. His successors, Saint 
Louis, Philippe-le-Hardi, and Philippe-le-Bel did 
their part in enlarging and beautifying the struc- 
ture, and Saint Louis laid the foundations of 
that peerless Gothic gem — La Saint Chapelle. 

From the windows of the Palais de la Cite 
another Charles assisted at an official massacre, 
differing little from that of Saint Bartholemew's, 
which was conducted from the Louvre. 

On the first floor of the Palais de Justice of 
to-day is the apartment paved in a mosaic of 
black and white marble, with a painted and 
gilded wooden vaulting, where Charles V received 
the Emperor Charles IV and the ^^Roi des Ro- 



Palais de la Cite and Touraelles 63 

mains.'* The three monarchs, accompanied by 
their famihes, here supped together around a 
great round marble table, a secret supper prolific 
of an entente cordiale which must have been the 
forerunner of recent ceremonies of a similar 
nature in France. 

Known as the Salle de Marbre, this great 
chamber came later to be the Tribunal where 
the courts sat. It was only after the death of 
Charles VI, at the beginning of the fifteenth 
century, that the Palais de la Cite was given 
over wholly to the disciples of Saint Yves, the 
judges, advocates and notaries. It became also 
the definite seat of the Parliament and took the 
nomenclature of Palais de Justice, though still 
inhabited at intermittent intervals by French 
royalties. One such notable occasion was that 
when Henry V of England was here married to 
Catherine de France, and when Henry VI of 
England took up his temporary residence here 
as king to the French. 

In the fourteenth century the precincts of the 
Palais de la Cite — the open courtyard one as- 
sumes is meant — were invaded by the stalls 
of small shopkeepers, some of which actually 
took root in wood and stone and became fixtures 
to such an extent that the courtyard was known 
as the Galerie des Merciers. 



64 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

The great marble chamber after becoming 
the meeting place of the Tribunal played a part 
at times dignified and at others banal. An in- 
cident is recorded where the clerks and minor 
court officials danced on the famous marble 
table and "played farces" with the judicial 
bench serving as a stage. It was said that, on 
account of the immoralities which they repre- 
sented, the authorities were obliged to suppress 
the performances by law, as they have in recent 
years the flagrant freedom of the "Quat'z Arts." 

Up to the times of Francis I but few events 
of importance unrolled themselves within the 
Palais de la Cite, but in 1618 a violent con- 
flagration broke out leaving only the round 
towers of the Conciergerie, the tower and the 
church, and that part of the main structure which 
housed the great Salle de Marbre, unharmed. 
Apropos of this, a joyous rhymester of the time 
made the following quatrain: 

" Certes ce fut un triste jeu 
Quand a Paris Dame Justice 
Pour avoir mange trop d'epice 
Se mit le Palais tout en feu." 

Jacques Debrosse was charged with rebuild- 
ing the edifice after the fire and refitted first the 
Grand Salle, to-day the famous Salle des Pas 



Palais de la Cite and Toumelles 65 

Perdus, crowded with the shuffling coming and 
going crowd of men and women whose business, 
or no business at all, brings them to this central 
point for the dissemination of legal gossip. It is 
a magnificent apartment, and, to no great extent, 
differs from what it was before the conflagration. 

This Salle consists of two parallel .naves sepa- 
rated by a range of arcades and lighted by two 
great circular openings with four round-headed 
windows at either end. Its attributes are prac- 
tically the same as they were in 1622. The 
structure, take it as a whole, may be said to 
date only from the seventeenth century, but 
certain it is that the old Palais de la Cite is in- 
corporated therein, every stone of it, and if its 
career was humdrum that was the fault of cir- 
cumstances rather than from any inherent faults 
of its own. 

The Conciergerie, that inelegant, inconsistent 
architectural mixture of the ancient and modern, 
considered apart, though it properly enough is 
usually considered with the Palais de Justice, 
was formerly the dwelling or guardhouse of the 
Concierge of the Palais de la Cite. His post was 
not merely that of the keeper of the gates; he was 
a personage at court and was as autocratic as his 
more plebeian contemporaries of to-day, for the 
Paris concierge, as we, who have for years lived 



66 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

under their despotism well know, is a very dread- 
ful person. 

In addition to being the governor of the royal 
dwelling this concierge was the guardian of the 
royal prisoners. In 1348 he was further invested 
with the official title of Bailli and the post was, 
at times, occupied by the highest and the most 
noble in the land, among others Philippe de 
Savoie, the friend of Charles VI, and Juvenal 
des Oursins, the historian of this prince. The 
first to combine the two functions, that of Bailli 
and Concierge, was Jacques Coictier, the doctor 
of Louis XI. 

As a virtual prison the Conciergerie only came 
to be transformed when Charles V quitted the 
residence of the Palais de la Cite, and the Con- 
ciergerie, as such, only figures on the Tournelles 
registers under date of 1391. 

The fire of the latter part of the eighteenth 
century destroyed a large part of the building, 
but enough remained to patch together the most 
serviceable of Revolutionary prisons, for at one 
time it held at least twelve hundred poor souls, 
of whom two hundred and eighty-eight were 
killed off at one fell blow. 

But one woman among them all actually came 
to her death within the prison walls. This was 
La Belle Bouquetiere of the Palais Royal who, 



Palais de la Cite and Toumelles 67 

in an access of jealous furor, horribly mutilated 
a royal guardsman, and for this met a most cruel 
death by being transfixed to a post and sub- 
mitting to a trial of ^^le fer et le jeu.^^ In just 
what manner the punishment was applied one 
can best imagine for himself. 

The Revolutionary role of the Conciergerie 
is a thing apart from the purport of this book, 
hence is not further referred to. 

Going back to the time of Francis I, among 
the famous prisoners of state were Louis de 
Berquin, the Comte de Mongomere, the regicides 
Ravaillac and Damiens, the Marechal d'Ancre, 
Cartouche, Mandrin and others. To-day, as 
a prison, the Conciergerie still performs its func- 
tions acceptably, safeguarding those up for the 
assizes, and those condemned to death before 
being sent on their long journey. 

The three great flanking towers of the Con- 
ciergerie are its chief architectural distinction 
to-day. That of the left, the largest, is the Tour 
d' Argent, that of the middle, the Tour Bonchet, 
and the third, the Tour de Cesar or the Tour 
de PHorloge. This last is the only one which 
has preserved its mediaeval crenulated battle- 
ments aloft. The great clock has been commonly 
considered the largest timepiece of its kind 
extantj but it is doubtful if this now holds good 



68 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 



with railways and insurance companies vying 
with each other to furnish the hour so legibly 
that he who runs may read. 

Across the Pont au Change, from the Palais 
de la Cite, by the Louvre and out into the Fau- 
bourg Saint Antoine, one comes to the Place des 
Vosges, the old Place Royale, which occupies 
almost the same area as was covered by the court- 
yard of the Palais des Tournelles, so called from 
its many towers. 

All around the Palais des Tournelles was 
located a series of splendid hotels prives of the 
nobility. In one of these, the Hotel de Saint 
Pol, the king once lodged twenty-two visiting 
princes of the quality of Dauphin (the eldest 
son of a ruling monarch), their suites and do- 
mestics. 

Charles V in his time amalgamated with his 
royal palace three of these magnificent private 
dwellings, the Hotel du Petit Muse, the Hotel 
de I'Abbe de Saint Maur and the Hotel du Comte 
d'Etampes. 

The palace proper really faced on what is now 
the Rue Saint Antoine, opposite the Hotel Saint 
Pol. Its historic and romantic memories of the 
sword and cloak period of gallantry were many, 
but the edifice was demolished by the order of 
Catherine de Medici 



Palais de la Cite and Toumelles 69 

In the palace Charles VI was confined, during 
the period of his insanity, by order of the cruel 
Isabeau de Baviere. The Duke of Bedford, 
when regent for the minor Henry VI, lodged 
here, and upon the expulsion of the English it 
became the residence of Charles VII. Louis XI 
and Louis XII each inhabited it, and the latter 
died within its walls. 

The Palais des Tournelles will go down to 
history chiefly because of that celebrated jousting 
bout held in its courtyard on the marriage day 
of the two princesses, Elizabeth and Marguerite. 

Henri II and the elder princes, his sons, were 
to ride forth in tournament and break lances, 
if possible, with all comers. The court, in- 
cluding Catherine de Medici and the princess 
Elizabeth, wife of Philippe II, the late husband 
of Mary Tudor, the two Marguerites and other 
high personages were seated on a dais upholstered 
in damascened silk and ornamented with many- 
coloured streamers. 

The time was July and the morning. At a 
signal from Catherine music burst forth and 
the bouts began. 

The king rode forth at the head of his chev- 
aliers, wearing a suit of golden armour, his 
sword handle set with jewels, and, in spite of 
the presence of his wife, his lance flying black 



70 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

and white streamers, the colours of Diane de 
Poitiers, who had lately turned her affections 
from father unto son. 

A herald proclaimed the opening of the combat, 
and before night the king had broken the lances 
of the Dues de Ferrare, de Guise, and de Nemours, 
and was just about disarming when a masked 
knight approached from the Faubourg Saint 
Antoine and challenged the king, who, in spite 
of being implored to desist by his queen, entered 
the lists again and was ultimately wounded 
unto death by the sable knight. 

Henri II expired the same night in a bed- 
chamber of the Palais des Tournelles, whither 
he had been carried, at the age of forty-one, 
the victim of chance, or the wile of the Sieur de 
Montgomeri, the ancestor of England's present 
Earl of Eglinton. The captain of the Scotch 
Guards, Montgomeri, was not immediately pur- 
sued (he meantime had fled the court), but 
Catherine de Medici harboured for him a most 
bitter rancour. Pro and con ran his cause, for 
he had his partisans, but the Marechal de Matig- 
non finally caught up with him in Normandy 
and he was tortured and condemned to death 
for the crime of lese majeste — beating the king 
at his own game. 

The widowed queen angrily ordered Diane 



Palais de la Cite and Toumelles 71 

de Poitiers from the court, and caused the Palais 
des Tournelles to be razed. This was her only 
means of showing her contempt for the woman 
who had played her royal spouse to his death 
as the Romans played the gladiators of old; 
and Tournelles, as a palatial monument of its 
time, blotted out the rest when it disappeared 
from view. 

A forest of spirelets soared aloft from the 
gables and rooftrees of the Palais des Tournelles. 
There was no spectacle of the time more impos- 
ing than this sky-line silhouette of a Paris palace; 
not at Chambord nor Chenonceaux was the 
spectacle more fine. It was like a fairy castle, 
albeit that it was in the heart of a great city. 

To the right of the Palais des Tournelles, 
beyond the Porte Saint Antoine, was the ink- 
black, frowning donjon of the Bastille, its severity 
in strong contrast with the more luxurious palaces 
of the princes which surrounded it not far away. 

The charming Place des Vosges, which occupies 
the site of Tournelles to-day, is another of Paris's 
breathing spaces. Well may it be called a royal 
garden — a park virtually on a diminutive scale 
— since it was originally known as the Place 
Royale, under Henri IV. 

With the advent of the gascon Henri de Beam 
this delightful little unspoiled corner of old Paris 



72 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

took on the aspect which it now has. Within 
this enclosure were the usual garden or park 
attributes, more or less artificially disposed, 
but making an ideal open-air playground for 
the court, shut in from outside surroundings 
by the outlines of the old palace walls, and not 
too far away from the royal palace of the 
Louvre. 

The first and greatest historic souvenir of this 
garden was a Carrousel given in 1612, by Marie 
de Medici, two years after the tragic death of 
Henri IV, celebrating the alliance between France 
and Spain. Under Richelieu the square be- 
came known as the Place des Vosges, and, in 
spite of the law against duelling, which had 
by this time come into force, it became a cele- 
brated meeting place for duellists like Ivry, the 
"Grand' Roue'' or the "VeP Hiver" of to-day. 

It was on May 12, 1627, that the Comte des 
Chappell killed Bussy d'Amboise on this spot, 
and left a bloody souvenir, which was only for- 
gotten by the historians when they had to recount 
another meeting, this time between the Catholic 
Due de Guise and the Protestant Coligny 
d'Andelot. 

'^Monsieur," said the duke, "we will now 
proceed to settle that little account between 
our illustrious houses," and with that he drew 



Palais de la Cite and Toumelles 73 

his sword and killed Coligny, as if he were but 
stamping the life out of a caterpillar. 

Now, with all this bloody memory behind, 
the Place became one of the most elegant resi- 
dential quarters of the capital, preferred above 
all by the nobility, the Rohans, the Alegres and 
Rotroux. 

At No. 21 lived Victor Hugo, just before the 
Coup d'Etat, in the house first made famous as 
the habitation of the somewhat infamous Marion 
Delorme. 

Among other illustrious names who have given 
a brilliance to these alleyed walks and corridors 
are to be recalled Corneille, Conde, Saint Vincent 
de Paul, Moliere, Turenne, Madame de Longue- 
ville, De Thou, Cinq-Mars, Richelieu, D'Ormes- 
son, the Prince de Talmon, the Marquis de Tesse 
and the Comte de Chabanne. 

It is possible that this charming Paris square 
will remain as ever it has been, for a recent at- 
tempt of the owner of one of the houses which 
borders upon it to change the disposition of the 
facade brought about a law-suit which com- 
pelled him to respect the procedure which ob- 
tained in 1605 when it was ordained the Place 
Royale. 

To prove their rights the civic authorities had 
recourse to the original plans still preserved in 



74 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

the national archives. This is a demonstra- 
tion of how carefully European nations preserve 
the v^ritten records of their pasts. 

The decision finally arrived at by the courts 
— that the Place des Vosges must be kept intact 
as originally planned — gave joy to the hearts 
of all true Parisians and archeologists alike. 




BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF OLD PARIS 



-"'^^^-^"^^ • - -^ --•- ■'- — - 



h 



CHAPTER V 

THE OLD LOUVRE AND ITS HISTORY 

A STROLL by the banks of the Seine will review 
much of the history of the capital, as much of 
it as was bound up with Notre Dame, the Louvre 
and the Palais de la Cite (now the Palais de 
Justice), and that was a great deal, even in mediae- 
val and Renaissance times. 
\The life of the Louvre was Paris; the life of 
Paris that of the nation; and the life of the nation 
that of the people. This even the Parisians of 
to-day will tell you. It is scant acknowledg- 
ment of the provinces to be sure, but what would 
you ? The French capital is much more the capital 
of France than London is of England, or Wash- 
ington of America — leaving politics out of the 
question. 

Paris before the conquest by the Franks 
was practically only the Seine-surrounded isle 
known as Lutetia, and later as "La Cite," and 
the slight overflow which crept up the slopes of 
the Montagne de la Sainte Genevieve. From 
the Chatelet to the Louvre was a damp, murky 

75 



76 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

swamp called, even in the moyen-age, Les Cham- 
peaux, meaning the Little Fields, but swampy 
ones, as inferred by studying the evolution of 
the name still further. 

A rapid rivulet descended from Menilmontant 
and mingled with the Seine somewhere near the 
Garden of the Tuileries. 

Clovis and his Franks attacked the city op- 
posite the isle, and, upon the actual achievement 
of their conquest, threw up an entrenched camp 
on the approved Roman plan in what is now 
the courtyard of the old Louvre, and filled the 
moat with the waters of this rivulet. The en- 
semble was, according to certain authorities, 
baptized the Louvre, or Lower, meaning a forti- 
fied camp. This entrenchment was made neces- 
sary in order that the Franks might sustain 
themselves against the Gallo-Roman occupants 
of Lutetia, and in time enabled them to acquire 
the whole surrounding region for their own 
dominion. This the Lower, or Louvre, made 
possible, and it is well deserved that its name 
should be thus perpetuated, though actually 
the origin of the name is in debate, as will be 
seen by a further explanation which follows. 

Little by little this half -barbaric camp — in 
contradistinction to the more solid works of the 
Romans — became a place fort, then a chateau, 



The Old Louvre and Its History 77 

then a palace and, finally, as the young lady 
tourist said, an art museum. Well, at any rate, 
it was a dignified evolution. 
^^ Two Louvres disappeared before the crystal- 
lization of the present rather irregularly cut gem. 
From the Merovingians dates the Louvre des 
Champs, the hostile, militant Louvre, with its 
high wood and stone tower, familiar only in old 
engravings. After this the moyen-age Louvre, 
attributable to Saint Louis and Charles V, with 
its great tower, its thick walls of stone and its 
deep-dug moats, came into being. With Francis 
I came a more sympathetic, a more subtle 
era of architectural display, a softening of out- 
lines and an interpolation of flowering gables. 
It was thus that was born that noble monument 
known as the New Louvre, which combined all 
the arts and graces of a fastidious ambition. 
( Nothing remains of the old Louverie (to 
which the name had become corrupted) which 
Philippe Auguste early in the thirteenth century 
caused to be turned into an ambitious quad- 
rangular castle from a somewhat more humble 
establishment which had evolved itself on the 
site of the Frankish camp, save the white marble 
outline sunken in the pavement of the court- 
yard of the palace of to-day. By destiny this 
palace, set down in the very heart of Paris, was 



78 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

to dominate everything round about. From the 
date of its birth, and since that time, it has had 
no rivals among Paris or suburban palaces. 
Its very situation compelled the playing of an 
auspicious part, and the Seine flowing sv^iftly 
by its ramparts added no small charm to the 
fetes and ceremonies of both the Louvre and the 
Tuileries. 

^ Never was a great river so allied with the life 
of a royal capital; never a stream so in harmony 
with other civic beauties as is the Seine wath Paris. 
When Henri II entered Paris after his Sacra- 
ment he contemplated a water-festival on the 
Seine, which was to extend from the walls of 
the Louvre to the towers of Notre Dame, a festival 
with such elaborate decorations as had never 
been known in the French capital. 

The kings of France after their Sacrament 
entered the Louvre by the quay-side entrance, 
followed by their cortege of gayly caparisoned 
cavaliers and gilded coaches with personages of 
all ranks in doublet and robe, cape and doublet. 
The scintillating of gold lace and burnished coats 
gave a brilliance which rivalled that of the 
sun. 

No sooner had the cavalcade entered the gates 
of the Louvre than it came out again to partici- 
pate in the day and night festival, which had the 



The Old Louvre and Its History 79 

bosom of the Seine for its stage and its bridges 
and banks for the act drop and the wings. 

The receptions of Ambassadors, the baptisms 
of royalties, royal marriages and celebrations 
of victories, or treaties, were all feted in the same 
manner. 

Napoleon glorified the Peace of Amiens under 
similar conditions, and there is scarce a chroni- 
cler of any reign but that recounts the part 
played by the Seine in the ceremonies of the 
court of the New and Old Louvre. 

It was amid a setting which lent itself so readily 
to all this that the Old Louvre, which was rebuilt 
by Francis I, first came to its glory. 
^ The origin of the name Louvre has still other 
interpretation from that previously given. It 
seems to be a question of grave doubt among 
the savants, but because the note is an interest- 
ing one it is here reproduced. The name may 
have been derived as well from the word ceuvrej 
from the Latin opus; it may have been evolved 
from lupara, or louverie (place of wolves), which 
seems improbable. It may have had its evolu- 
tion from either one of these origins, or it may 
not. 

Anglo-Saxons may be proud of the fact that 
certain French savants have acknowledged that 
the name of the most celebrated of all Paris 



80 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

palaces is a derivation from a word belonging 
to their tongue and meaning habitation. This, 
then, is another version and one may choose 
that which is most to his liking, or may go back 
and show his preference for lower, meaning a 
fortified place. 

N A palace — something more elaborate than 
a mere habitation — stood on the same site in 
the twelfth century, a work which, under the ener- 
gies of Philippe Auguste, in 1204 began to grow 
to still more splendid proportions, though in- 
finitesimal one may well conclude as compared 
with the mass which all Paris knows to-day 
under the inclusive appellation of "The Louvre." 
The Paris of Philippe Auguste was already 
a city of a hundred and twenty thousand in- 
habitants, with mean houses on every side and 
little pretense at even primitive comforts or con- 
veniences. This far-seeing monarch laid hand 
first on the great citadel tower of the fortified 
lower, added to its flanking walls and built a 
circling rampart around the capital itself. It 
is recounted that the rumbling carts, sinking 
deep in mud and plowing through foot-deep 
dust beneath the palace windows, annoyed the 
monarch so much that he instituted what must 
have been the first city paving work on record, 
and commanded that all the chief thoroughfares 



The Old Louvre and Its History 81 

passing near the Louvre should be paved with 
cobbles. This was real municipal improve- 
ment. He was a Solon among his kind for, 
since that day, it has been a sine qua non that 
for the well-keeping of city streets they must be 
paved, and, though cobblestones have since 
gone out of fashion, it was this monarch who 
first showed us how to do it. 
\ The Louvre of Philippe Auguste was the most 
imposing edifice of the Paris of its time. To no 
little extent was this imposing outline due to its 
great central tower, the maitresse, which was sur- 
rounded by twenty-three dames dlionneur, with- 
out counting numberless tourelles. This hydra- 
towered giant palace was the real guardian of 
the Paris of mediaevalism, as its successor is 
indeed the real centre of the Paris of to-day. 
V The city was but an immense mass of low- 
lying gable-roofed houses, whose crowning apex 
was the sky-line of the Louvre, with that of Tour- 
nelles only less prominent to the north, and that 
of La Cite hard by on the island where the 
Palais de Justice and Notre Dame now stand. 
\ Before the hand of Francis fell upon the Louvre 
it was but an isolated stronghold — a combined 
castle, prison and palace, gloomy, foreboding 
and surrounded by moats and ramparts almost 
impassable. Philippe Auguste built well and 



82 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

made of it an admirable and imposing castle 
and a place of defence, and a defence it was, 
and not much more. 

For its time it was of great proportions and of 
an ideal situation from a strategic point of view; 
far more so than the isolated Palais de la Cite 
in the middle of the Seine. 

Four gates led out from the inner courtyard 
of the Old Louvre: one to the Seine; one to the 
south, facing Saint Germain I'Auxerrois; another 
towards the site of the later Tuileries; and the 
other to about where the Rue Marengo cuts 
the Rue de Rivoli of to-day. 

With the endorsement given it by Philippe 
Auguste the Louvre now became the official 
residence of the kings of the Capetian race, 
whereas previously they had dwelt but intermit- 
tently at Paris, chiefly in the Palais de la Cite. 

The monarch, as if to test the efficiency of his 
new residence as a stronghold, made a dungeon 
tower, his greatest constructive achievement un- 
til he built the castle of Gisors, and in the tower 
imprisoned the Comte de Flandre, whom he 
had taken prisoner at Bouvines. Louis IX 
(Saint Louis), in his turn, built a spacious annex 
to Philippe Auguste's Louvre, to which he attached 
his name. 

Charles V totally changed the aspect of the 




TT 














The Old Louvre and Its History 83 

palace from what it had formerly been — half- 
fortress, half-residence — and made of it a verit- 
able palace in truth as well as in name, by the 
addition of numerous dependencies. 

Within a tower which was built during the 
reign of this monarch, called the Tour de la 
Librairie, he assembled his royal bibelots and 
founded what was afterwards known as the 
Bibliotheque du Louvre, the egg from which 
was hatched the present magnificently endowed 
Bibliotheque Nationale in the Rue Richelieu. 

It is related that in 1373 the valet-de-chambre 
of Charles V made a catalogue of the nine hun- 
dred and ten volumes which formed this col- 
lection, an immense number for the time when 
it is known that his predecessor, Jean-le-Bon, 
possessed but seven volumes of history and 
four devotional books as his entire literary 
treasure. 

This seems to be a bibliographical note of 
interest which has hitherto been overlooked. 
Charles V was evidently a man of taste, or he 
would not have built so well, though all is hear- 
say, as not a fragment remains of the work upon 
which he spent his talents and energies. 

From the death of Charles V, in 1364, until 
1557 the Louvre by some caprice ceased to be 
a permanent royal residence. At the latter 



84 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

epoch the ambitious, art-loving Francis I con- 
ceived the idea that here was a wealth of 
scaffolding upon which to graft some of his 
Renaissance luxuries and, by a process of ^' res- 
toration" (perhaps an unfortunate word for 
him to have employed, since it meant the razing 
of the fine tower built by Charles V), added 
somewhat to the splendours thereof, though in 
a fickle moment, as was his wont, allowed a gap 
of a dozen years to intervene between the out- 
lining of his project and the terrifically earnest 
work which finally resulted in the magnificent 
structure accredited to him, though indeed it 
meant the demolition of the original edifice. 

It was at this period that Charles V entered 
into the ambitious part which Francis was to 
henceforth play in the Louvre, so perhaps the 
interruption was pardonable. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE LOUVRE OF FRAJNCIS I AND ITS SUCCESSORS 

One can attribute the demise of the Old Louvre 
to the coming of Charles V to Paris in 1539. 
This royal residence, hastily put in order to re- 
ceive his august presence, seemed so coldly 
inconvenient and inhospitable to his host, Fran- 
cis I, that that monarch decided forthwith 
upon its complete reconstruction and enlarge- 
ment. Owing to various combinations of cir- 
cumstances the actual work of reconstruction 
was put off until 1546, thus the New Louvre 
as properly belongs to the reign of Henri II as 
to that of his father. 

Francis I, more than any other European 
monarch of his time, or, indeed, before or since, 
left his mark as an architect of supreme tastes 
over every edifice with which he came into per- 
sonal contact. His mania was for building — 
when it was not for affairs of the heart — and 
so daring was he that when he could not get an 
old fabric to remodel he would brave all, as did 
Louis XIV at Versailles, and erect a dream 

85 



86 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

palace in the midst of a desert. This he did 
at Chambord in the Sologne. At Paris his 
difficulties were perhaps no less, but he had his 
materials and his workmen ready at hand. 

Francis's repairs and embellishments to the 
Old Louvre were by no means perfunctory, but 
he saw possibilities greater than he was able to 
perform with the means at hand. He first razed 
the central tower, or donjon^ and scarce before 
the departure of his royal guest, was already 
dreaming of replacing the entire fabric with 
another which should bear the same name. One 
has read of the monarch's thoughts when he was 
awaiting the coming to Paris of his old enemy 
in the peninsula; how he regretted the moment 
when he should sally out to meet him and leave 
his new-found friend, the Duchesse d'Etampes, 
in spite of her pleadings for him to remain by 
her. All this is mere historic incident, and 
has little to do with Francis's art instincts and 
ambitions. He probably thought this very thing 
himself when he replied to the importunate 
lady: ''Duchesse, I must tear myself away with- 
out more ado; I go to meet my brother monarch 
at Amboise on the Loire." 

It was Francis I, the passionate lover of art, 
who collected the first pictures which formed 
the foundation of the present collections of the 



The Louvre of Francis I 87 

Musee National du Louvre. He bought many 
in foreign parts, and many others were brought 
from Italy by Italian artists, whom he had com- 
manded to the capital: Primaticcio brought with 
him, upon his arrival, more than a hundred 
antique statues. These art objects were first 
assembled at Fontainebleau and ornamented 
the apartments of the king. Among them were 
Da Vinci's "La Joconde'^ and Raphael's "Holy 
Family and Saint Michael." 
\ Henri II, Henri IV, and Louis XIII did little to 
enrich the art collections of the palace, but Louis 
XIV charged his minister, Colbert, with numer- 
ous purchases. In 1661 he bought the fine col- 
lection left by Cardinal Mazarin, and ten years 
later purchased the contents of the celebrated 
gallery belonging to the banker Jacob of Cologne. 
The state expended for these acquisitions nearly 
six hundred thousand livres, and received for this 
sum six hundred paintings and six thousand 
drawings. 

It was at this period that the royal collections 
were transferred to Paris, a little before the 
death of Colbert, when they were placed in the 
galleries of the Louvre; though it was a hundred 
years later that a national museum was actually 
created. This was virtually brought about from 
the fact that the royal collections were trans- 



88 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

ported in a great part to Versailles, only to be 
returned to Paris in 1750, transferred again to 
Versailles, and ultimately to be returned to 
Paris under the sheltering wing of the grand 
old Louvre. 

'The Museum of the Louvre, the Museum 
National et Central des Arts, is the outgrowth 
of a Decree of the Convention, dated July 27, 
1793. It was aided and enriched considerably 
under Napoleon I, that passionate lover of the 
beautiful, who, none too scrupulously, would 
even seek to "make a campaign'* in order to 
acquire art works for the museum of his 
capital. 

Many of these abducted art treasures (like 
the horses of Saint Marc, for instance) were 
afterwards returned to their original owners, 
but the nucleus of this unrivaled art museum 
was chiefly due to the consul and emperor. 

As soon as Charles V had left the Louvre 
demolition was at once begun by Francis, and 
in 1 541 an Italian, Serlio, was bidden pre- 
pare a set of plans for the Renaissance glory 
that was to be. Serlio, refusing, or debating 
the price, was cast aside for the Frenchman, 
Lescot, whose plan was adopted. 

The work can in no way be said to have suf- 
fered by the change of plans, for though Pierre 



The Louvre of Francis I 89 

Lescot was as yet a name unknown in the world 
of architecture his talents were sufficiently great, 
magistrate and parliamentary counsellor though 
he was, to give to Paris what has ever been ac- 
counted its chief Renaissance glory. 

Work was begun at once, a work which was 
not interrupted by intrigues of court, of love, 
of war, nor by the deaths of Francis I nor his 
successor, Henri II. 

Although the work was begun in an energetic 
manner it was 1555 before the western wing 
was ready for the hand of the sculptors, but from 
this time on, judging from the interpolated mono- 
grams of Charles IX and Henri IV on the south 
wing, work progressed less hurriedly. The two 
other constructions, which were to enclose the 
quadrangle to the north and east, were com- 
pleted under such circumstances that there has 
never been a question as to their period. 

For fifteen years the work went on, when 
suddenly it was abandoned as were the plans 
of Lescot. A sole wing, that following the Seine 
and abutting at right angles against the Pa- 
vilion de I'Horloge, had resulted. 

The sculptures of its south fa5:ade, as well 
as certain of its interior decorations, were en- 
trusted to Jean Goujon (1520-1572), who became 
a victim of the horrible night of Saint Barthol- 



90 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

omew, planned in the same Louvre by the wily 
Medici. 

Henri II often dwelt over Lescot's plans and 
devices, and, on one occasion, when the poet 
Ronsard was present, demanded of the architect 
the meaning of the decorations surrounding 
a great mil-de-hoduf window, two kneeling figures, 
one blowing a trumpet, and the other extend- 
ing a palm branch. "Victory and Fame," re- 
plied Lescot. And, in honour of the architect 
and his sentiment, Ronsard composed his ''Fran- 
ciade." The detail was actually by Goujon, 
whose design it was, under the oversight of the 
master architect. One may see this chef d^ceuvre 
to-day just above the courtyard portal to the 
west. 

At the death of Henri II, Catherine de Medici 
came here to live alone, and built the great ex- 
tension, which stands to-day and joins the Old 
Louvre with that portion along the banks of 
the Seine by the double arch, through which 
swing the autobusses coming from the Rive 
Gauche with such a Juggernaut grind that fears 
for the foundation of the palace are ever upper- 
most in the minds of those responsible for its 
preservation. 

It is in this Catherine de Medici portion of 
the Louvre (1578) that the present Galerie des 




The^ Louvre 







iti!-^; 



■^»i4^ 



90 Royal Palaces an ' France 



omew, planrx^'"^ ^^^ '^^' - ^^^ '^:>v,-r. "s.v the wily 
Medici. 

Henri II often dwelt over Lescot's plans and 
devices, and, on one occiision, when the poet 
Ronsard was present, demanded of the architect 
the mean in c' of the decorations surrounding 
:• LTc-'t a- uf window, two kneeling figures, 

i*t. and the other extend- 

victory and Fame," re- 

i, in honour of the architect 

ntimeni, Ronsard composed his '^Fran- 

ciade.'' The detail was actually by Goujon, 

whose design it wa^^, under the oversight of the 

master ar< )ne may see this chef d^ceuvre 

to-dav just a'rjove 3^^^oiiJ''^ffI^^^ portal to the 

ienri II, Catherine de Medici 

done, and built the great ex- 

ids to-day and joins the Old 

portion along the banks of 

rtc double arch, through which 

'busses coming from the Rive 

ha Juggernaut grind that fears 

of the palace are ever upper- 

oi those responsible for its 

:»iC dc Medici portion of 
the present Galerie des 



The Louvre of Francis I 91 

Antiques is installed, and which is usually thronged, 
in season and out, with globe-trotting sight- 
seers who give seldom a thought to its construc- 
tive elegance and its association with the Medici. 

With the first years of the reign of Charles IX, 
there is to be remarked a notable slowness of 
procedure with regard to the construction of 
the New Louvre. This was brought about 
chiefly by the conception of the Tuileries and 
the work which was actually begun thereon. 
Soon a gigantic idea radiated from the ambi- 
tious mind of Catherine de Medici. In this con- 
nection it must be remembered, however, that 
Catherine, so commonly reviled as " the Italian, '' 
was not all Italian; French blood flowed through 
her veins through that of her mother, Madeleine 
de la Tour d'Auvergne. She came first to France, 
landing at Marseilles, whence she arrived from 
Leghorn, and forthwith commenced her journey 
Parisward, arriving finally at the Louvre as the 
bride of Prince Henri in the guise of a simple, 
clever girl, though indeed she was twenty years 
the elder. 

Now she dreamed of uniting her chateau of 
the Tuileries with that of the king by a long, 
connecting gallery. She put action to the thought 
and under Pierre (II) Chambiges, a relative of 
the Chambiges of Fontainebleau and Saint Ger- 



92 R oyal Palaces and Parks of France 

main, the Petite Galerie, a mere means of com- 
munication between the two chateaux, and not 
the least to be Hkened to a defensive structure, 
was begun and work thereon carried out be- 
tween 1564 and 1571, though it remained for 
Thibaut Metezeau, in 1595-1596, to carry it on 
a stage further under Henri IV. 

This architect introduced the notorious mez- 
zanine, which has so intrigued historians of the 
Louvre because of the unequal elevations of the 
various floors, a procedure which was unavoid- 
able save by recourse to a substitution less to 
be objected to than the existing fault. Actually 
the connection with the Tuileries was made by 
the prolongation of this gallery by the Ducer- 
ceau brothers in 1595. The work existing to- 
day, but only in its reconstructed form, is the 
same as that completed by Napoleon III (1863- 
1868). 

Charles IX and Henri III, though making 
the Louvre their residence, practically had no 
hand in its embellishment. The former gave 
his energies and ideals full play in the Saint 
Bartholomew massacres and shot at poor un- 
fortunates who fled beneath the windows of his 
apartments on the quay-side of the Louvre. 
This, if not the chief incident of his association 
with the fabric, is at least the best remembered 



The Louvre of Francis I 93 

one. Henri III, too, led a scandalous life with- 
in the walls of the Louvre and fled on horse- 
back, smuggled out a back door, as it were, 
on a certain May evening in 1588, never more 
to return, for the Dominican monk Jacques 
Clement killed him with a knife-thrust before 
he had got beyond Saint Cloud. 

The accepted tale of the part played by the 
famous window of the Louvre in the drama of 
Saint Bartholomew's night is as follows: As 
the signal tolled from the belfry of Saint Ger- 
main I'Auxerrois it was answered by another 
peal from the great bell of the Palais de Justice, 
where, within a small apartment over the water- 
gate of the Louvre, the queen and her two sons 
were huddled together not knowing what might 
happen next. The multitude streamed by on 
the quay before the palace, and, finally, amid all 
the horror of Coligny's murder, and the throw- 
ing of his body from a window of the Louvre 
to the street below, Charles IX stood at his win- 
dow regarding the fleeing Huguenots as so much 
small game, shooting away at them with an ar- 
quebuse as they went by, and with an unholy 
glee, even boasting that he had killed a score 
of heretics in a quarter of an hour. 

Historians of those exciting times were per- 
haps none too faithful chroniclers and Charles's 



94 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

"excellent shots'' in his "royal hunt," and 
hideous oaths and threats such as : "We'll have 
them all, even the women and children," are 
not details as well authenticated as we would 
like to have them. Like Rizzio's blood stains 
they lack conviction. 

' The ambitious white-plumed Henri de Navarre, 
when he became Henri IV of France, set about 
to connect the tentacle which stretched south- 
ward from the Old Louvre with the Tuileries 
(a continuation of the project of Catherine de 
Medici), and, by the end of the sixteenth century, 
had built a long facade under the advice of the 
brothers Ducerceau. This work was added to 
on the courtyard side under the Second Empire, 
when a reconstruction, more likely a strengthen- 
ing of underpinning and walls because of their 
proximity to the swift-flowing waters of the 
Seine, of the work of Henri IV was undertaken. 
Joining the Tuileries and this work of Ducer- 
ceau was the celebrated Pavilion de Flore, a 
work of the Henri IV period rather than that 
of Catherine de Medici. 

From the Pavilion de Flore to the Pavilion de 
Lesdiguieres ran this long gallery of the Ducer- 
ceau and numerous interstices and unfinished 
vaults and arches leading towards the Old Louvre 
were, at this epoch, completed by Metezeau and 



The Louvre of Francis I 95 

Dupaira. The chief apartment of this structure 
became known as the Galerie Henri IV, and 
was completed in 1608. 

\At the death of Henri IV, Richelieu, who at 
times builded so well, and who at others was a 
base destroyer of monuments, demolished that por- 
tion which remained of the edifice of Charles V. 
The work of Pierre Lescot was preserved, how- 
ever, and to give symmetry and an additional 
extent of available space the rectangle facing 
Saint Germain PAuxerrois to-day was com- 
pleted, thus enclosing in one corner of its ample 
courtyard the foundations of the earlier work 
whose outlines are plainly traced in the pave- 
ment that those who view may build anew — if 
they can — the old structure of Philippe Auguste. 
In mere magnitude the present quadrangle is 
something more than four times the extent of 
the Louvre of the time of Charles V. 

This courtyard of the Louvre is perhaps that 
spot in all Paris which presents the greatest 
array of Renaissance art treasures. From ground 
to sky-line the facades are embroidered by the 
works from the magic hand of the Siecle Italien, 
Jean Goujon himself has left his brilliant sou- 
venirs on all sides, caryatides, festoons, bas- 
reliefs, statues and colonnades. 

"Enthusiasm and devotion knew no bounds 



96 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

among those old craftsmen, but all is well-ordered, 
regular and correct. "He who mentions the 
Louvre to a Frenchman gives a greater pleasure 
than that of Mehemet-Ali when one praises 
the pyramids." In a way the Louvre is the most 
magnificent edifice in the universe; "four palaces 
one piled up on another, une ville entiere.''^ And 
when the Louvre was linked with the Tuileries 
in the real, what a splendour it must have been 
for former generations to marvel at! "Za 
plus belle et la plus grande chose sous le 
soleil. " 

This work of aggrandizement of the quad- 
rangle was carried out by the architect Lemercier 
on the basis of a project adopted in 1642, and, 
to a great extent, completed before the arrival 
of Anne d'Autriche, twenty years later. 

This queenly personage had ideas of her own 
as to what sort of a residence she would have in 
Paris, and beyond her personal needs little was 
done for the moment towards actually linking 
up the various loose ends, each more or less 
complete in itself, which now composed the Paris 
palace of the French monarchs. 

Her son, the king in person if not in power, 
was not likely to be endowed with instincts which 
would put him in the rank of the traditional 
castle or palace builders of his race; it was litera- 



The Louvre of Francis I 97 

ture, music and painting which more particularly 
flourished during his reign, and so the Austrian 
contented herself at first with merely putting 
the former apartments of Catherine de Medici 
into condition for her personal use and building 
a Salle-de- Spectacle, and — happy thought — a 
Salle-des-Bains. 

Louis XIV, as he found time, after the war 
of the Fronde, actually did bethink himself of 
completing, in a way, the work of his elders, 
and charged the architect Levau to finish off 
the north wing, which was done in 1660. A 
year later the Galerie Henri IV was practically 
destroyed by fire and rebuilt by Levau, who 
gave the commission for its interior decoration 
to Lebrun. 

Soon the south wing was completed, leaving 
only the gap for the eastern facade which was 
intended to be the chief entrance to the mass 
of buildings, which still bore the comprehensive 
name of ''The Louvre.'* 

For the accomplishment of this facade, the 
demolition of certain dwellings of the nobility 
which had clustered around the royal fabric 
was necessary, and the Hotels du Petit Bourbon, 
de Villequier, de Chaumont, La Force, De Crequy, 
de Longueville, and de Choisy fell before the 
picks of the house-breakers. Levau commenced 



98 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

work on the facade at once, and made rapid 
progress until 1664, when an abrupt order came 
for him to stop all work. Political conspiracy, 
graft, if you like, was at work, and Colbert, 
little favourable towards Levau, made a proposi- 
tion to the king to open a competition for the 
design and execution of the facade. Willingly 
enough, his mind doubtless more occupied with 
other things, Louis XIV agreed, and a general 
call was sent out to all French architects to enter 
the lists. Confusion reigned, and Levau was 
about to be recalled when Colbert spied an un- 
rolled parchment in the corner and pounced 
upon it eagerly as the means of saving him from 
the dubious efforts of the former incumbent. 
" It was the "non-professional" plan submitted 
by a doctor in medicine, one Charles Perrault. 
Jealous competitors made all sorts of criticisms 
and objections, the chief contention being that 
if by any chance an architectural design by a 
"pill-roller" proved pleasing to the eye it was 
bound to be impracticable from an economic 
or constructive point of view, or both. This is 
often enough true, and it proved to be so in this 
case, for in spite of a certain amount of advice 
from an expert Italian builder, who had come 
to Paris to help the good doctor with his difficult 
task (for he actually received a commission for 



The Louvre of Francis I 99 

the work and completed it in 1674), the facade 
did not fit the rest of the fabric with which it 
was intended to join up, and to-day it may be 
observed by the curious as being several feet out 
of line with the structure which faces on the 
Rue de Rivoli. 

^ Louis XIV practically had no regard for the 
Louvre and its architectural traditions; his pala- 
tial garden-city idea, worked out at Versailles, 
shows what an innovator he was. He allowed 
the Louvre to be filled up with all sorts of riff- 
raff, who were often given a lodging there in 
place of a money payment for some service 
rendered. The Louvre thus became a sort of 
genteel poor-house, while king and court spent 
their time in the more ample country-house 
behind the Meudon hills. 

X By 1750 the Louvre had become little more 
than an immense ruin, humbled and desecrated; 
a veritable orphan. The Marquis de Marigny, 
Surintendant des Batiments Royaux, obtained 
the authorization to chase out the parasites and 
clean up the Augean stable and put things in 
order as best pleased his esthetic fancy, but 
only with the early years of the nineteenth cen- 
tury did the Louvre become a real palace again 
and worthy of its traditions. 
From 1803 to 1813 the architects Fontaine 



100 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

and Percier were constantly engaged in the 
work of repairs and additions, and built (for 
Napoleon I) the gallery which extends from 
what is now the Place Jeanne d'Arc to the Pavil- 
ion de Rohan, along the Rue de Rivoli. This 
detached portion (bound only to the Tuileries) 
was finally joined to the seventeenth century 
work of Lemercier under Louis Napoleon in 
1852. This gallery, the work of "moderns," 
is no mean example of palace-building, either. 
It was the work of Visconti and Lefuel, and with 
the adoption of this plan was finally accomplished 
the interpolation of that range of pavilions which 
gives the architecture of the Louvre one of its 
principal distinctions. Named after the princi- 
pal ministers of former administrations — Donon, 
MoUien, Daru, Richelieu, Colbert, Turgot, etc., 
these pavilions break up what would other- 
wise be monotonous, elongated facades. 

The inauguration of this last built portion 
of the palace was held on August 14, 1857, 
the occasion being celebrated by a banquet 
given by Napoleon III to all the architects, 
artists and labourers who had been engaged upon 
the work. In the same Salle, two years later, 
which took the name of Salle des Etats, the 
emperor gave a diner de gala to the generals 
returning from the Italian campaign. 



The Louvre of Francis I lOl 

Still further resume of fact with regard to the 
main body of the Louvre, as well as with respect 
to its individual components, will open never- 
ending vistas and pageants. It is not possible 
in a chapter, a book or a five-foot shelf to limn 
all that is even of cursory interest. The well- 
known, the little-known and the comparatively 
unknown mingle in varying proportions, accord- 
ing to the individual mood or attitude. To 
some the appeal will lie in the vastness of the 
fabric, to others in the varied casts of characters 
which have played upon its stage, still others 
will be impressed with the dramatic incidents, 
and many more will retain only present-day 
memories of what they have themselves seen. 
The Louvre is a study of a lifetime. 

To resume a none too complete chronology, 
it is easy to recall the following important events 
which have taken place in the Louvre since the 
days of Henri III, the period at which only the 
barest beginnings of the present structure had 
been projected. 

In 1 59 1 a ghastly procedure took place when 
four members of the Conseil des Seize were hung 
in the Salle des Caryatides by orders of the Due 
de Mayenne. 

Like the horoscope which foretold the death 
of Henri III, another royal prophecy was cast 



102 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

in 1610 that reminds one of that which perhaps 
had not a little to do with the making away with 
the last of the Valois princes. 

The Due de Vendome, the son of Henri IV 
by Gabrielle d'Estrees, handed the king a docu- 
mentary horoscope signed by an astrologer call- 
ing himself La Brosse, which warned the king 
that he would run a great danger on May 14 
in case he went abroad. 

"La Brosse is an ass," cried the king, and 
crumpled the paper beneath his feet. 
. On the day in question the king started out 
to visit his minister. Sully, at the Arsenal. It 
was then in turning from the Rue Saint Honore 
into the Rue de la Ferroniere that the royal coach, 
frequently blocked by crowds, offered the op- 
portunity to the assassin Ravaillac, who, jump- 
ing upon the footboard, stabbed the king twice 
in the breast. 

\ After having been wounded the king was 
brought dying to the Louvre. His royal coach 
drew up beneath the vault through which throngs 
all Paris to-day searching for a "short cut" 
from the river to Saint Honore. It was but a 
short, brief journey to the royal apartments 
above in the Pavilion de FHorloge, but it must 
have been an interminable calvary to the gallant 
Henri de Navarre. The body was received by 



The Louvre of Francis I 103 

Marie de Medici in tears, and the Dues de Guise 
and d'Epernon clattered out the courtyard on 
horseback to spread the false news that the king 
had suffered no harm. Fearing the results of 
too precipitate publishing of the disaster no 
other course was open. 

A gruesome memory is that the Swiss Guard 
at the Louvre surreptitiously acquired a ^'quartier^^ 
of the dismembered body of the regicide and 
roasted it in a fire set alight beneath the balcony 
of Marie de Medici as an indication of their 
faithfulness and loyalty. 

Mt w^as Sully, the king's minister, who ran 
first up the stairs to acquaint the queen of the 
tragedy — faithful ever to the interests of his 
royal master. In spite of this, one of the first 
acts of Marie de Medici as regent was to drive 
the Baron de Rosny and Due de Sully away. 
Such is virtue's reward — sometimes. 

*^L •!« ^U ^ ^U «£« 

^^ •J* r|* 0j% ^* #^ 

v" Lying on his bed, his face uncovered, clad 
in white satin and a bonnet of red velvet em- 
broidered with gold, was all that remained 
of Henri IV of France and Navarre. Around 
the bed were nuns and monks from all the 
monasteries of Paris to keep vigil of his soul." 

So ends the chronicle closing the chapter of the 
relations of Henri IV with his Paris palace. 



104 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

^ No particularly tragic event took place here 
for some years. Henriette de France, widow 
of Charles I of England, taking refuge in France 
from the troublous revolt at home, lived in the 
Louvre in 1644. She had at first been graciously 
received by Mazarin, but was finally accorded 
only the most strict necessities of life, a mere 
lodging in the Louvre, a modest budget and a 
restricted entourage. 

In 1662, under Louis XIV, MoHere and his 
troup, in a theatre installed in the Salle des Cary- 
atides, gave the first "command" performance 
on record. The plays produced were, '^Nico- 
deme" and "Le Docteur Amoureux." 

An "art note'' of interest is that Sylvain Bailly, 
the first curator of the Musee du Louvre, was 
born within its precincts in 1736. 
\ In the dark days of July, 1830, the populace 
attempted to pillage and sack the palace, but 
after a bloody reprisal retired, leaving hundreds 
of dead on the field. The parterre beneath 
the famous colonnade was their burial place, 
though a decade later the bodies were exhumed 
and again interred under the Colonne de Juillet 
in the Place de la Bastille. 

Le Notre, the gardener of kings, laid out the 
first horticultural embellishments of the palace 
surroundings under Louis XIV, and with little 



The Louvre of Francis I 105 

change his scheme of decoration lasted until 
the time of Louis Philippe, who made away with 
much that was distinctive and excellent. 

Napoleon III came to the front with an im- 
proved decorative scheme, but the hard flags 
of to-day, the dusty gravel and the too sparse 
architectural embellishments do not mark the 
gardens of the Louvre as being anything remark- 
able save as a desirable breathing spot for Paris 
nursemaids and their charges. 
\The iron gates of the north, south and east 
sides were put into place only in 1855, and at 
the Commune served their purpose fairly well 
in holding the rabble at bay, a rabble to whose 
credit is the fact that it respected the artistic 
inheritance enclosed by the Louvre's walls. No 
work of art in the museums was stolen or de- 
stroyed, though the library disappeared. 



CHAPTER VII 



THE TUILERIES AND ITS GARDENS 




Z^X 







X B ji.L.flii.il ■■BBiii ' I R.| I"!'! iiniiii ^ 



OR.IGrI3SrAXa T=>UA.y<J of ^e. "rTJlLiE.R.IHl& 



No more sentimental interest ever attached 
itself to a royal French palace than that which 
surrounded the Tuileries from its inception by 
Charles IX in the mid-sixteenth century to its 
extinction by the Commune in 1871. 

-The Palace of the Tuileries is no more, the 
Commune did for it as it did for the Hotel de 
Ville and many another noble monument of the 
capital, and all that remains are the gardens set 

106 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 107 

about with a few marble columns and gilt balls 
— themselves fragments of former decorative 
elements of the palace — to suggest what once 
was the heritage bequeathed the French by the 
Medici who was the queen of Saint Bartholo- 
mew's night. 

_It was a palace of giddy gayety that drew its 
devotees to it only to destroy them. '^Crowned 
fools who wished to be called kings, and others." 
Even its stones were chiselled as if with a certain 
malignancy and fatalism, for they have all dis- 
appeared, and their history, even, has not been 
written as large as that of those of many con- 
temporary structures. 

Of the last five kings to which the Tuileries 
gave shelter — not counting the Second Em- 
peror — only one went straightway to the tomb ; 
one went to the scaffold and three others to exile. 
A sorry dowry, this, for an inheritor of a palace 
at once so noble and admirable in spite of its 
unluckiness. 

With the court followers and the nobility of 

the last days of the monarchy it was the same 
thing; the Tuileries was but a temporary shelter. 
The scaffold accounted for many and banish- 
ment engulfed others to forgetfulness. 
^ It was a commonplace at the time to re- 
peat the warning: '^O! Tuileries! O! Tuileries! 



108 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

^Mad indeed are those who enter thy walls, for 
^like Louis XVI, Napoleon, Charles X and Louis 
Philippe you shall make your exit by another 
door." 

The origin of the name Tuileries is somewhat 
ignominiously traced from that of a tile factory 
which existed here in the heart of Paris, on the 
banks of the Seine, in the sixteenth century. 
The property, which comprised a manor-house 
as well as the tile fields, was known by the name 
of La Sablonniere, and came to the Marquis 
Neuville de Villeroy, Superintendent of Finances, 
who built on the spot a sort of fortified chateau, 
which, if not of palatial dimensions, was of a 
palatial prodigality of luxury. 

Louise de Savoie, mother of Francis I, ac- 
quired the property in 1518 and nine years later 
gave it to Jean Tiercelin, the Maitre d'Hotel 
of the dauphin, who later was to become Henri II. 

The lodge, or manor-house, had, by 1564, 
fallen into so ruinous a state that Catherine 
de Medici, the widow of Henri II, set about to 
lay the foundations of a new royal palace. 

Catherine never resided in her projected palace, 
and in 1566 Charles IX, her son, gave the com- 
mission to Philibert Delorme to build a palace, 
"neighbouring upon the Louvre, but not to be 
connected therewith, on the site of the Tuileries." 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 109 

On July II, work was begun, and the central 
pavilion and the two extremes were carried up 
two stories within a year. The central structure 
was a great circular-domed edifice, enclosing 
a marvellous Escalier d'Honneur. The fa,gside, 
preceded by two terraced porticos, was on the 
courtyard, or garden, between the edifice and 
the Louvre. It sat back to the present Rue des 
Tuileries. 

The Tuileries did not become a royal residence 
for some time after its completion, for Charles IX 
clung tenaciously to his well-guarded apartments 
in the Louvre; for the central structure of the 
Tuileries, because of its lack of comparative 
height, was hardly as much of a stronghold as 
he would have liked. 

A contemporary note in connection with 
Charles IX and the Tuileries is found in Ron- 
sard's ^^Epitre a Charles /X." 

'* J'ay veu trop de magons 
Bastir les Tuileries, 
Et en trop de fagons 
Faire les momeries." 

Work on the edifice so auspiciously planned 
by Delorme was practically discontinued dur- 
ing the reign of Henri III, owing to lack of funds. 

The Renaissance of Delorme, BuUant, Lescot, 



110 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

each of whom had a hand in the building of the 
Tuileries, expressed certain characteristic phases 
of architectural art in the reigns of Francis I 
and Henri II. The reign of Charles IX was 
only another phase of that long reign of Catherine 
de Medici, and architectural influences continued 
to follow along the same reminiscent Italian 
lines, particularly with reference to such edifices 
as the Medici herself caused to be built. In 
the dedication of Philibert Delorme's ^^Traite 
d* Architecture^^ he expressed himself thus with 
regard to the Tuileries: 

"Madame, I see from day to day with an 
increasing pleasure the interest that your Majesty 
takes in architecture. The palace which you 
have built at Paris near the Pont Neuf and the 
Louvre is, according to its disposition, excellent 
and admirable to the extent that it pleases me 
beyond measure." 

After Delorme considerable changes were made 
and successfully carried out under the archi- 
tects Ducerceau, Duperac, Levau and Dorbay. 

A distinct feature of the work of Delorme 
was his use of the column ornamented through- 
out its length, which, as he says in his written 
works, he first employed in the ^^ Palais de la 
Majeste de la Royne-Mere a Paris. ''^ 
^Of the ability of Delorme there is no diversity 



The Tuileries and its Gardens ill 

of opinion to-day, nor was there in his time. 
Besides the Tuileries he has to his credit the 
Chateau d'Anet, the Chateau de Saint Maur, 
that of Meudon — built for the Cardinal de 
Lorraine, — and his important additions to the 
Chateau de la Muette and the Chateaux of Saint 
Germain, Madrid and Fontainebleau. 

As might be supposed Catherine de Medici 
professed a great admiration for Delorme and 
recompensed his talents with a royal generosity, 
even nominating him as Abbe of the Convent 
of Saint Eloi de Noyon, a fact which caused the 
poet Ronsard to evolve a political satire: ''La 
Truelle Crossee. " 

At the same time that she was building the 
Tuileries Catherine de Medici caused additions 
to be made to the Louvre; at least she undertook 
the completion of the unfinished portion, which 
had been left for other hands to do. 

VThe first historic souvenir which stands out 
prominently with regard to the Palais des Tuil- 
eries is the fete given four days before the fate- 
ful Saint Bartholomew's night. It was the mar- 
riage fete of the gallant Henri de Beam, King of 
Navarre, and the wise and witty Marguerite 
de Valois. 

Henri IV, coming to the throne a quarter of 
a century after the admirable first year's work 



112 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

on the Tuileries had been completed, found 
that little had been done towards making it a 
really habitable place. It had been hurriedly 
finished off to the second story, and had served 
well enough for a temporary residence, or as an 
overflow establishment where balls and fetes 
might be given without crowding, but to the 
ambitious Henri IV nothing would do but that 
the pavilions should be bound together with a 
more imposing ligature, and that the Pavilion 
de Flore should in turn be linked up with the 
Louvre by a gallery. 

Under Louis XIII this latter really came to a 
conclusion according to the plans of the architect 
Ducerceau, but the inspiration of making the 
Louvre and the Tuileries one was due to Henri IV. 
' Under Louis XIV and Louis XV the palace 
in its still attenuated form was scarcely more 
than a rambling lodging, utterly lacking any 
of the noble apartments with which it was after- 
wards endowed. The court at this time prac- 
tically made Versailles its headquarters. Neither 
of the above-mentioned monarchs made aught 
but cursory visits to the Tuileries and left its 
occupancy to officers of the household and minis- 
ters of state. 

It was in the reign of Louis XV that the Floren- 
tine artist, Servandoni, who was at the same 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 113 

time an eminent architect, a remarkable painter 
and a maestro of a musician, organized in the 
Palais des Tuileries the Theatre des Machines, 
the first installed at Paris, and there came the 
Comedie Fran^iaise, the Opera and the Bouffes 
(the Comedie Italienne) and gave command 
performances before the court. 

When the French resolved that Louis XVI 
should live in Paris, the Palais des Tuileries 
was actually offered him, but it was a rather 
shabby place of royal residence so far as its 
interior appointments were concerned, though 
in all ways appealing when viewed from with- 
out. Considerable repairs and embellishments 
were made, but warring factions did much to 
make difficult any real artistic progress. 

' With the advent of Louis XVI there came a 
contrast to gayety and freedom from care in royal 
hearts and heads. On October 5 Louis XVI 
and the royal family hid themselves behind 
barred doors, the convention taking up its sittings 
under the same roof and forthwith passing an 
act which allowed the completion of the palace 
according to the plans of Vignon at an expense 
of three hundred thousand livres. An almost 
entire transformation took place, the money 
being seemingly well spent, and the structure 
now first took its proper place among the monu- 
mental art treasures of the capital. 



114 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

,, A dramatic incident took place at the great 
gate of the Tuileries, which faced the court- 
yard, when, on May 28, 1795, the populace 
surged in waves against its sturdy barrier. The 
Deputy Feraud met them at the steps. "You 
may enter only over my dead body," he said. 
No reply was made but to crack his skull, be- 
head the trunk and carry the head aloft on a 
pike to the very Tribune where Boissy d'Anglas 
was presiding. 

The Salle de Spectacle of the Tuileries was, 
even at this period, the largest auditorium of 
its kind in Europe, having eight thousand stalls 
and boxes, which gave a seating capacity of con- 
siderably more than that number of persons. 
' In 1793 this playhouse, of which the parquet 
occupied the ground floor of the Pavilion de 
Marsan, underwent a strange metamorphosis 
when it became the legislative hall for the Na- 
tional Convention. All the names and em- 
blems showing forth in its decorations and in- 
dicative of its ancient rule were changed into 
Republican devices and symbols. The Pavilion 
de Marsan was called the Pavilion de PEgalite, 
the Pavilion du Centre became the Pavilion de 
rUnite and the Pavilion de Flore the Pavilion 
de la Liberte, where was lodged the Committee 
of Public Safety. 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 115 

The Hall of the Convention, according to reports 
of the time, was an appalling mixture of grandeur 
and effeminacy with respect to its architectural 
lines. Surrounding that portion where the legisla- 
tors actually sat was the great amphitheatre 
which for three years was occupied by a curious, 
vociferous public, more demonstrative, even, than 
those that had attended the former theatrical 
representations in the same apartment. 
\ From the opening of the National Convention 
to the reaction of "Thermidor" it is estimated 
that more than three million people assisted at 
what they rightly, or wrongly, considered as a 
"spectacle" staged only for their amusement. 
\ By the time Napoleon had come into power 
the Tuileries was hardly habitable, and before 
taking up his residence he was obliged to make 
immediate and extensive transformations. 
\ On February 19, 1800, Napoleon, still First 
Consul, left the Palais de Luxembourg and took 
up his residence in the Tuileries, the Third Consul, 
Lebrun, being lodged in the Pavilion de Flore, 
in the "Petite Appartement, " which Marie An- 
toinette had fitted up for her temporary accom- 
modation when in town. Lebrun, however, gave 
up his lodging to the Pope when the Pontiff came 
to Paris at Napoleon's orders. Consul Cam- 
baceres, however, refused to shelter himself 



116 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

beneath the roof of the Tuileries, and indicated 
a preference for the magnificent Hotel d'El- 
bceuf, which was accommodatingly put at his 
disposition. 

Napoleon entered the Tuileries in state, pre- 
ceded and followed by an imposing cortege. 
At the gate of the Carrousel the consuls alighted 
from their carriages, and were received by the 
Consular Guard. On their arrival the consuls 
read the following inscription posted at the 
entrance: "On August loth monarchy in France 
was forever abolished; it will never be restored." 
By the 20th of February the inscription had 
disappeared. Besides, orders were given to 
cut down the two liberty trees which had been 
planted in the courtyard. On August 10 a 
large quantity of cannon shot had been lodged 
in the facade of the Tuileries, and around the 
shot were written these words: ^^ Tenth of Au- 
gust." The cannon balls disappeared, as well 
as the inscriptions, when the Arc de Triomphe 
was erected on the Place du Carrousel. 

This alteration gave great satisfaction. It 
was important for the tranquillity of France that 
the new government should inherit rather the 
sword of Charlemagne than the guillotine of 
Marat. 

The imperial court soon displayed its splendour 




Salle des Marechaux, Tuileries 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 117 

and magnificence in the Palais des Tuileries, as 
a foregone conclusion anticipated. 
' In a gorgeous and imposing Salle du Trone 
one might have seen in the deep casement of the 
central window, standing up, their hats off, 
the group of the Corps Diplomatique, the mem- 
bers of which, loaded with decorations, ensigns, 
and diamonds, trembled in the presence of the 
Little Corporal of other days; on the other 
side, the host of the Princes of the Rhine Con- 
federation — all the personages that Germany, 
Russia, Poland, Italy, Denmark, Spain, all 
Europe, in one word, England excepted, had 
sent to Paris. 

It is needless to say that the wedding reception 
of Napoleon and Marie Louise at the Tuileries 
was celebrated with unusual magnificence. An- 
other event, on account of its peculiar moment, 
strongly excited the enthusiasm of the French. 
On March 20, 181 1, at seven o'clock in the 
morning, the first salute of cannon announced 
that the empress had given birth to a child, the 
future Aiglon, the King of Rome. 
V After Napoleon's occupancy of the Tuileries 
it again served the monarch under the Empire, 
the Restoration, under Louis Philippe and under 
the Second Empire. The palace of unhappy 
memory saw successively the fall of Napoleon, 



118 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

the entry of Louis XVIII, the file-by of the Allies, 
the flight of Louis XVIII, of Charles X, Louis 
Philippe and Napoleon III. 

Up to the time of the Second Empire the Tuil- 
eries preserved, more or less, its original in- 
terior arrangement, and, to a great extent, the 
decorations with which it had been embellished 
under Louis XIV, Louis XVI, and Napoleon I. 

The Pavilion de Flore, at the juncture of the 
Tuileries and the Louvre of Henri IV, was prac- 
tically rebuilt during the Second Empire, but 
it followed closely the contemporary designs 
of the adjoining building. Here are quartered 
executive offices of the Prefecture de la Seine. 
That portion facing the Pont Royal contains a 
series of fine sculptures by Carpeaux, the sole 
modern embellishments of this nature to be seen 
in or on a Paris palace. 

'y As the Commune mob was fleeing before the 
army of Versailles a conflagration broke out in the 
Tuileries and soon the whole edifice was in flames. 
Within what may have been the briefest interval 
on record for a conflagration of its size the Tuileries 
was but a smoking pile of half-calcined stones. 

The Tuileries had another brief day of glory 
when the Prince President, Louis Napoleon, 
entered its gates, coming straight from his in- 
auguration at Notre Dame. 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 119 

The cannon at the Hotel des Invahdes blazed 
out a welcome and every patriot Republican 
shouted: '^Vive Napoleon!" They little knew, 
little cared perhaps, that he would some day 
become the Second Emperor. 

The throng poured forth from the cathedral 
after the Domine Salvum and the benediction, 
the clergy leading the way, followed by the presi- 
dent and his attendants. The orchestra played 
a lively march, and the great bell in the tower 
boomed forth a glorious peal. 

^t^ >1^ *if^ ^j^ ^t^ %^ ^^ *^ 

«^ ^^ ^^ ^* *^ ^* 'J* '^ 

The president's carriage drew up before the 
gates of the Tuileries and he entered the great 
apartment where a reception was given to various 
public and military bodies. Between seven and 
eight thousand naval and military officers paid 
their respects, and about half a battalion of the 
army saluted, among them two Mamelukes. 
While this ceremony was going on, the Place du 
Carrousel was occupied by several squadrons 
of cavalry and the inner courtyards were prac- 
tically infantry camps. The government was 
taking no chances at the beginning of its career. 
The reception lasted until well on towards even- 
ing, when a banquet of four hundred covers was 
laid and partaken of by the invited guests. 

The last days of the Tuileries may be said to 



120 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

have commenced with that eventful September 3, 
1870, at five o'clock in the afternoon, when the 
Empress Eugenie received a telegraphic despatch 
from Napoleon III announcing his captivity 
and the defeat of Sedan. It was the overthrow. 

The evening and the night were calm; the 
masses, as yet, were unaware of the fatal news 
the journals would publish on the morrow. The 
following day was Sunday; the weather superb; 
the disaster was finally announced and the masses 
thronged from all parts to the Place de la Con- 
corde, where a squadron of Cuirassiers barred 
the bridge leading to the Palais Bourbon where 
the deputies were in session. 

On the arrival of the news the empress had 
called in General Trochu, the Military Governor 
of Paris, and asked him if he could guarantee 
order. He replied in the afiirmative. Some 
hours later a group of deputies came to the em- 
press and counselled her to sign, not an abdica- 
tion, but a momentary renunciation of her powers 
as regent. Eugenie refused point-blank. 

The throng, passing by the left bank, had 
arrived at the Chamber of Deputies, and the 
formal sitting became a revolutionary one. At 
three o'clock the imperial dynasty was pro- 
claimed as at an end, and a provisionary govern- 
ment installed. Henri Rochefort, the present 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 121 

editor of the ^^ Intransingeant^^^ was delivered 
from the prison of Sainte Pelagie and made a 
member of the government. 

By this time the mob which had invaded the 
Place de la Concorde became menacing. The 
cry, "Aux Tuileries," first launched by the street 
gamins, soon became the slogan of the crowd. 
To say it was to do it; the great iron gates were 
closed, but in default of a protecting force of 
arms it was an easy matter to scale them. 

Behind the curtained windows of the palace 
the empress witnessed the assault and murmured 
to her ladies-in-waiting: "It is then finished." 
She turned towards the Prince de Metternich 
and the Chevalier Nigra, and, in the voice of a 
suppliant, demanded: ^^Que me ccnisillez vous?^^ 

"You must leave at once, Madame; in a moment 
the palace will be invaded." 

The empress became resigned and accompanied 
by Madame Le Breton, Metternich and Nigra 
started for the Pavilion de Flore, passing through 
the Galerie de Musee and the Galerie d'Apol- 
lon, finally leaving by the gate of the Louvre, 
which is opposite Saint Germain FAuxerrois. 
' The empress was at last out of the palace, 
but not yet out of danger. A band of mani- 
festants, making for the Hotel de Ville and shout- 
ing: ''Vive la Republique," recognized the em- 



122 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

press, but she mounted an empty fiacre with 
Madame Le Breton, and giving the driver the 
first address that entered her mind thus escaped 
further indignities, and perhaps danger. Finally 
she found a refuge with Doctor Evans, the Ameri- 
can dentist living in the Avenue Malakoff, from 
whose house she left for England on the follow- 
ing day. 

This is the Frenchman's point of view of one 
of the picturesque incidents of history. It dis- 
poses of the legend that the empress left the 
Tuileries in the carriage of Doctor Evans, but 
this cannot be helped, with due regard for the 
consensus of French opinion. Doctor Evans 
was a family friend, besides being the dentist 
who cared for the imperial teeth, and it is not 
going beyond the truth to state that the fortunate 
American acquired not a little of his vogue and 
wealth by his association with Napoleon III and 
his family. 

By this time the populace had invaded the 
palace and cursed with indignities unmention- 
able the marble halls, and the furnishings in 
general, and pillaged such portable property as 
pleased the individual fancies of the spoilsmen, 
j After the signing of the Peace Treaty by the 
Bordeaux Assembly, which now represented the 
governmental head, and Thiers had become presi- 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 123 

dent, that worthy would do away with the can- 
non of which the National Guard still held pos- 
session in their garrison on the Butte of Mont- 
martre. The orders which he sent forth came 
to be the signal for another outbreak on the 
part of the populace. On March 18 the Com- 
mune was proclaimed and Citoyen Dardelle, 
an old African hunter, was appointed military 
governor of the Tuileries. Whatever this indi- 
viduaPs military qualifications may have been, 
he delivered himself to the enjoyment of a high 
and dissolute life in his luxurious apartments 
in the palace; a fact which was speedily made 
note of by the still restless populace. 

The Citoyen Rousselle, a member of the Com- 
munal Government, had the idea of organizing 
a series of popular concerts in the gardens of 
the Tuileries for the profit of the wounded in 
the late friction. 

Hung on the walls, at the entrance of each 
apartment was a placard which read: '^Fellow 
men, the gold with which these walls were built 
was earned by your sweat." "To-day you are 
coming to your own." "Remain faithful to your 
trust and see to it that the tyrants enter never 
more." 

During one of these public concerts a poem 
of Hegesippe Moreau was read which termi- 



124 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

nated as follows, and set the populace aflame. 

******** 

"Et moi j'applaudirai ; ma jeuneusse engourdie 
Se rechauffera a ce grand incendie." 

He referred to the burning of the former abode 
of emperors and kings as a sort of sacrifice to 
the common good. The public had held itself 
in hand very well up to this moment, but ap- 
plauded the verses vociferously. The last of 
the concerts was held on May 21, the same day 
as the Army of Versailles entered Paris. Night 
came, and with it the raging, red flames spring- 
ing skywards from the roof of the Tuileries. 
^ In a few moments the flames had enyeloped 
the entire building. All the forces that it was 
possible to gather had been ordered upon the 
scene, but they were unable to save the old palace, 
and by one o'clock in the morning it was but a 
mass of smoking ruins. The Communards had 
done their work well. Before leaving its pre- 
cincts they had sprinkled coal oil over every 
square metre of carpet, window-hangings and 
tapestries, and the slow-match was not long in 
passing the fire to its inflammable timber. The 
library of the Louvre was destroyed, but the 
museums, galleries and their famous collections 
fortunately escaped. 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 125 

\ For a dozen years the lamentable ruins of the 
old palace of the Tuileries reared their singed 
walls, a witness and a reproach to the tempestu- 
osity of a people. Finally, in 1882, Monsieur 
Achille Picard undertook their removal for thirty- 
three thousand francs, and within a year not a 
vestige, not an unturned stone remained in its 
original place as a witness to this chapter of 
Paris history. 

Two porticos of the Pavilion de PHorloge, 
originally forming a part of the Tuileries, have 
been re-erected on the terrace of the Orangerie, 
facing the Place de la Concorde. 

There remain but two survivors of the late 
imperial sway in France, the Empress Eugenie 
who lives in England, and Emile Olivier, 'H^homme 
au coeur leger^^^ who lives at Saint Tropez in 
the Midi. 

A Paris journalist a year or more ago, while 
sitting among a little coterie of literary and 
artistic folk at Lavenue's famous terrace-cafe, 
recounted the following incident clothed in most 
discreet language, and since it bears upon the 
Tuileries and its last occupants it is repeated 
here. 

\ "Last night beneath the glamour of a Septem- 
ber moon I saw a black shadow silently creep 
out from beneath the gloom of the arcades of 



126 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

the Rue de Rivoli just below the Hotel Continen- 
tal. It crossed the pavement and passed within 
the railings of the gardens opposite, one of the 
gates to which, by chance or prearranged design, 
was still open. It moved slowly here and there 
upon the gravelled walks and seated itself upon 
a solitary bench as if it were meditating upon 
the splendid though sad hours that had passed. 
Was it a wraith; was it Eugenie, late empress 
of the French?'' 

To have remembered such a dream of fancy 
for forty long years one must have been endowed 
with superhuman courage, or an inexplicable 
conscience. 

The Rue des Pyramides, which has been pro- 
longed to the banks of the Seine, will give those 
of the present generation who have never seen 
the Tuileries an exact idea of its location. If 
it still existed the facade of the palace would 
front upon this street. 

The most moving history of the detailed hor- 
rors of the Commune, particularly with reference 
to the part played by the Tuileries therein, is 
to be found in Maxime Ducamp's ^^ Les Dernier s 
Convulsions de Paris. "^^ 

\One relic of the Tuileries left unharmed found 
a purchaser in a Roumanian prince, at a public 
sale held as late as 1889. This was the ornately 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 127 

beautiful iron gate which separated the Cour 
du Carrousel from the Cour des Tuileries. Rou- 
manian by birth, French at heart and Parisian 
by adoption, this wealthy amateur, for a trifle 
over eight thousand francs, became the owner of 
a royal souvenir which must have cost five hun- 
dred times that sum. 

\ The eastern front of the Tuileries opened into 
a courtyard formed under the direction of the 
first Napoleon. It was separated from the Place 
du Carrousel by a handsome iron railing with 
gilt spear-heads extending the whole range of 
the palace. From this court there were three 
entrances into the Place du Carrousel, the central 
gate corresponding with the central pavilion of the 
palace, the other two having their piers surmounted 
by colossal figures of victory, peace, history and 
France. A gateway under each of the lateral gal- 
leries also communicated on the north with the Rue 
de Rivoli, and on the south with the Quai du 
Louvre. The Place du Carrousel was named in 
honour of a tournament held upon the spot by Louis 
XIV in 1662. It communicated on the north with 
the Rue Richelieu and the Rue de I'Echelle, and 
on the south with the Pont Royal and the Pont du 
Carrousel. To-day in the square stands the trium- 
phal arch erected by Napoleon in 1806, after the 
designs of Percier and Fontaine. 



128 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

' The newly laid-out and furbished-up gardens 
make the Place du Carrousel even more attractive 
than it was when set about with flagged areas, 
gravelled walks and paved road ways, and, while 
the monumental and architectural accessories 
excel the horticultural embellishments in quan- 
tity, the general effect is incomparably finer at 
present than anything known before. 
"^ Plans for rebuilding the Place du Carrousel 
provide for a division into three distinct parts, 
three grand pelouses^ a boulingrins a la Franfais, 
or lawns of a circumscribed area, according to 
the best traditions of Le Notre, a border of flowers 
and a few decoratively disposed clumps of flower- 
ing shrubs, the whole combined in such a way 
that the perspective and vista down the Champs 
Elysees will in no manner suffer. The architect- 
landscapist, M. Redon, who has been charged 
with the work, has drawn his inspiration from 
a series of unexecuted designs of Le Notre which 
have recently been brought to light from the 
innermost depths of the national archives. It 
was a safe way of avoiding an anachronism, 
and this time a government architect has chosen 
well his plan of execution. 

In later years the question of the reembellish- 
ment of the Garden of the Tuileries has ever 
been before the public, but little has actually 



The Tuileries and its Gardens 129 

been changed save the remaking of certain 
garden plots, the planting of a few shrubs or the 
placing of a few statues. 

-^ The Garden of the Tuileries has a superficial 
area of 232,632 square metres. It is the most 
popular of all open spaces in the capital to the 
Parisian who would take his walks abroad not 
too far from the centre of things. The chief 
curiosity of the garden is the celebrated chest- 
nut tree which burst into flower on the day 
of Napoleon's arrival from Elba — March 20. 
The precocious tree has ever been revered by 
the Bonapartists since, though the tree has never 
performed the trick the second time. 

Statues innumerable are scattered here and 
there through the garden and give a certain 
sense of liveliness to the area. Some are by 
famous names, others by those less renowned, 
but as a whole they make little impression on 
one, chiefly, perhaps, because one does not come 
to the Garden of the Tuileries to see statues. 

To the left and right are the terraces, first 
laid out by the celebrated Le Notre. Like 
the hanging gardens of Babylon, they overlook 
a lower level of parterres, gravelled walks and 
ornamental waters. Along the Rue de Rivoli 
is the Terrasse de I'Orangerie, and on the side 
of the river is the Terrasse de la Marine. 



130 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

According to the original plans of Le Notre 
the garden was set down as five hundred toises in 
length, and one hundred and sixty-eight toises 
in width, the latter dimension corresponding to 
that of the facade of the palace. 

^ Along the shady avenues of this admirable city 
garden of to-day an enterprising concessionaire 
has won a fortune by renting out rush-bottomed 
chairs to nursemaids, retired old gentlemen 
with red ribbons in their buttonholes, and trip- 
pers from across the channel. It is a perfectly 
legitimate enterprise and a profitable one it would 
seem, and has been in operation considerably 
more than half a century. 

It was from the Gardens of the Tuileries in 
1784 that took place Blanchard's celebrated 
ascension in Montgolfier's balloon and brought 
forth the encomium from the British Royal Soci- 
ety that the body was not in the least surprised 
that a Frenchman should have solved the prob- 
lem of "volatability.'' The French monarch, 
more practical, was so mightily pleased with 
the success of the experiment that he bestowed 
upon the author the sum of four hundred thou- 
sand francs from his treasury to be used for the 
perfection of the art. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE PALAIS CARDINAL AND THE PALAIS ROYAL 

With the Louvre and the Tuileries the Palais 
Royal shares the popular interest of the traveller 
among all the monuments of Paris. No other 
edifice evokes more vivid souvenirs of its historic 
past than this hybrid palace of Richeheu. One 
dreams even to-day, of its sumptuousness, its 
legends, its amusing and extravagant incidents 
which cast a halo of romantic interest over so 
many illustrious personages. So thoroughly 
Parisian is the Palais Royal in all things that 
it has been called ^'the Capital of Paris." 

Not far from the walled and turreted strong- 
hold of the old Louvre rose the private palaces, 
only a little less royal, of the Rambouillets, the 
Mercoeurs and other nobles of the courtly train. 
They lived, too, in almost regal state until Armand 
du Plessis de Richelieu came to humble their 
pride, by fair means or foul, by buying up or 
destroying their sumptuous dwellings, levelling 
off a vast area of land, and, in 1629, commencing 
work on that imposing pile which was first known 

131 



132 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

as the Palais Cardinal, later the Palais d' Orleans, 
then as the Palais de la Revolution and finally as 
the Palais Royal. 

It was near, yet far enough away from the royal 
residence of the Louvre not to be overshadowed 
by it. The edifice enclosed a great square of 
ground laid out with symmetrically planted trees 
and adorned with fountains and statues. 
( From the great central square four smaller 
courts opened out to each of the principal points 
of the compass; there were also, besides the living 
rooms, a chapel, two theatres, ballrooms, bou- 
doirs and picture galleries, all of a luxury never 
before dreamed of but by kings. 

The main entrance was in the Rue Saint 
Honore, and over its portal were the graven arms 
of Richelieu, surmounted by the cardinal's hat 
and the inscription: "Palais Cardinal." Like 
his English compeer, Wolsey, Richelieu's ardour 
for building knew no restraint. He added block 
upon block of buildings and yard upon yard to 
garden walls until all was a veritable labyrinth. 
Finally the usually subservient Louis saw the 
condition of things; he liked it not that his minister 
should dwell in marble halls more gorgeous than 
his own. As a matter of policy the Cardinal 
ceased to build more and at his death, as if to 
atone, willed the entire property to his king. 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 133 

■ As the Palais Cardinal, the edifice was sub- 
jected to many impertinent railleries from the 
public which, as a whole, was ever antagonistic 
to the ^^ Homme Rouge.^^ They did not admit the 
right of an apostolic prelate of the church to 
lodge himself so luxuriously when the very pre- 
cepts of his religion recommended modesty and 
humility. Richelieu's contemporaries did not 
hesitate to admire wonderingly all this luxury of 
life and its accessories, and Corneille, in the 
^^Menteur " (1642), makes one of the principal 
characters say: 

" Non, I'univers ne peut rien voir d'egal 
Aux superbes dehors du Palais Cardinal; 
Toute une ville entiere avec pompe batie, 
Semble d'un vieux fosse par miracle sortie, 
Et nous fais presumer a ses superbes toits 
Que tous ses habitants sont des dieux ou des rois." 

\ The ground plan of the Palais Cardinal was 
something unique among city palaces. In the 
beginning ground values were not what they are 
to-day in Paris. There were acres upon acres of 
greensward set about and cut up with gravelled 
walks, great alleyed rows of trees, groves without 
number and galleries and colonnades innumerable. 
Without roared the traffic of a great city, a less 
noisy traffic than that of to-day, perhaps, but still 



134 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

a contrasting maelstrom of bustle and furor as 
compared with the tranquillity within. 

After the edifice was finished it actually fell 
into disuse, except for the periodical intervals 
when the Cardinal visited the capital. At other 
times it was as quiet as a cemetery. Moss grew 
on the flags, grass on the gravelled walks and 
tangled shrubbery killed off the budding flowers 
of the gardens. 

Richelieu's last home-coming, after the execu- 
tion of Cinq-Mars at Lyons, was a tragic one. 
The despot of France, once again under his own 
rooftree, threw himself upon his bed surrounded 
by his choicest pictures and tapestries, and paid 
the price of his merciless arrogance towards all 
men — and women — by folding his wan hands 
upon his breast and exclaiming, somewhat uncon- 
vincingly:. *'Thus do I give myself to God." As 
if recalling himself to the stern reality of things he 
added: '^I have no enemies but those of State." 

\In a robe of purple silk, supported by pillows 
of the finest down and covered with the rarest of 
laces, he rigidly straightened himself out and 
expired without a shudder, with the feeling that 
he was well beyond the reach of invisible foes. 
But before he died Richelieu received a visit from 
his king in person. This was another token of 
his invincible power. 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 135 

Thus the Palais Royal was evolved from the 
Palais Cardinal of Richelieu. Richelieu gave 
the orders for its construction to Jacques Lemer- 
cier immediately after he had dispossessed the 
Rambouillets and the Mercceurs, intending at 
first to erect only a comparatively modest town 
dwelling with an ample garden. Vanity, or some 
other passion, finally caused to grow up the mag- 
nificently proportioned edifice which was called 
the Palais Cardinal instead of that which was 
to be known more modestly as the Hotel de 
Richelieu. 

\ Vast and imposing, but not without a certain 
graceful symmetry, the Palais Royal of to-day is 
a composition of many separate edifices divided 
by a series of courts and gardens and connected 
by arcaded galleries. The right wing enclosed 
an elaborate Salle de Spectacle while that to the 
left enclosed an equally imposing chamber with 
a ceiling by Philippe de Champaigne, known 
as the Galerie des Hommes Illustres, and further 
ornamented with portraits of most of the court 
favourites of both sexes of the time. The archi- 
tectural ornamentation of this gallery was of the 
Doric order, most daringly interspersed with 
moulded ships' prows, anchors, cables and what 
not of a marine significance. 
^ In 1636, divining the attitude of envy of many 



136 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

of the nobility who frequented his palace, Riche- 
lieu — great man of politics that he was — made 
a present of the entire lot of curios to Louis XIII, 
but undertaking to house them for him, which he 
did until his death in 1642. 

■ At the death of Louis XIII the Palais Cardinal, 
which had been left to him in its entirety by the 
will of Richelieu, came to Anne d'Autriche, the 
regent, who, with the infant Louis XIV and 
the royal family, installed herself therein, and 
from now on (October 7, 1642), the edifice be- 
came known as the Palais Royal. 

I Now commenced the political role of this sump- 
tuous palace which hitherto had been but the 
Cardinal's caprice. Mazarin had succeeded 
Richelieu, and to escape the anger of the Fron- 
deurs, he, with the regent and the two princes, 
Louis XIV and the Due d'Anjou, fled to the 
refuge of Saint Germain-en-Laye. 

\In company with Mademoiselle de Montpen- 
sier, who had been rudely awakened from her 
slumbers in the Luxembourg, they took a coach 
in the dead of night for Saint Germain. It was 
a long and weary ride; the Pavi du Roi was then, 
as now, the most execrable suburban highroad 
in existence. 

When calm was reestablished Mazarin refused 
to allow the regent to take up her residence 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 137 

again in the old abode of Richelieu and turned 
it over to Henriette de France, the widow of 
Charles I, who had been banished from England 
by Cromwell. 

-Thirty odd years later Louis XIV, when he 
was dreaming of his Versailles project, made a 
gift of the property to his nephew, Philippe 
d'Orleans, Due de Chartres. Important recon- 
structions and rearrangements had been carried 
on from time to time, but nothing so radical as 
to change the specious aspect of the palace of 
the CardinaPs time, though it had been consider- 
ably enlarged by extending it rearward and an- 
nexing the Hotel Danville in the present Rue 
Richelieu. Mansart on one occasion was called 
in and built a new gallery that Coypel decorated 
with fourteen compositions after the ^nid of 
Virgil. 

\ Under the regency the Salon d' Entree was 
redecorated by Oppenard, and a series of mag- 
nificent fetes was organized by the pleasure- 
loving queen from the Austrian court. Riche- 
lieu's theatre was made into an opera-house, and 
masked balls of an unparalleled magnificence 
were frequently given, not forgetting to mention 
— without emphasis however — suppers of a 
Pantagruelian opulence and lavish orgies at which 
the chronicles only hint. 



138 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

In 1 66 1, Monsieur, brother of the king, took 
up his official residence in the palace, enlarged 
it in various directions and in many ways trans- 
formed and improved it. Having become the 
sole proprietor of the edifice and its gardens, by 
Letters Patent of February, 1692, the Due d'Or- 
leans left this superb property, in 1701, to his son 
the too famous regent, Philippe d' Orleans, whose 
orgies and extravagances rendered the Palais 
Royal notorious to the utmost corners of Europe. 

\The first years of the eighteenth century were 
indeed notorious. It was then that Palais Royal 
became the head-centre for debauch and abandon. 
It is from this epoch, too, that date the actual 
structures which to-day form this vast square of 
buildings, at all events their general outline is 
little changed to-day from what it was at that 
time. 

^ If the regent's policy was to carry the freedom 
and luxury of Richelieu's time to excess, replacing 
even the edifices of the Cardinal with more elabo- 
rate structures, his son Louis (i 723-1 752) sought 
in his turn to surround them with an atmosphere 
more austere. 

\ A disastrous fire in 1 763 caused the Palais 
Royal to be rebuilt by order of Louis Philippe 
d' Orleans, the future Philippe-Egalite, by the 
architect Moreau^ who carried out the old tra- 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 139 

ditions as to form and outline, and considerably 
increased the extent and number of the arcades 
from one hundred and eighty to two hundred 
and seven. These the astute duke immediately 
rented out to shopkeepers at an annual rental 
of more than ten millions. This section was 
known characteristically enough as the Palais 
Marchand, and thus the garden came to be sur- 
rounded by a monumental and classic arcade of 
shops which has ever remained a distinct feature 
of the palace. 

"^ A second fire burned out the National Opera, 
which now sought shelter in the Palais Royal, 
and in 1781 the Theatre des Varietes Amusantes 
was constructed, and which has since been made 
over into the home of the Comedie Fran^aise. 
yThe transformations imposed by Philippe-Ega- 
lite were considerable, and the famous chestnut 
trees, which had been planted within the court- 
yard in the seventeenth century by Richelieu, were 
cut down. He built also the three transverse 
galleries which have cut the gardens of to-day 
into much smaller plots than they were in Riche- 
lieu's time. In spite of this there is still that 
pleasurable tranquillity to be had therein to-day, 
scarcely a stone's throw from the rush and turmoil 
of the whirlpool of wheeled traffic which centres 
around the junction of the Rue Richelieu with the 



140 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Avenue de F Opera. It is as an oasis in a tur- 
bulent sandstorm, a beneficent shelf of rock in a 
whirlpool of rapids. The only thing to be feared 
therein is that a toy aeroplane of some child will 
put an eye out, or that the more devilish diaholo 
will crack one's skull. 

Under the regency of the Due Philippe d' Or- 
leans the various apartments of the palace were- 
the scenes of scandalous goings-on, which were 
related at great length in the chronicles of the 
time. It was a very mixed world which now 
frequented the purlieus of the Palais Royal. Men 
and women about town jostled with men of 
affairs, financiers, speculators and agitators of all 
ranks and of questionable respectability. Mi- 
lords, as strangers from across the Manche came 
first to be known here, delivered themselves to 
questionable society and still more questionable 
pleasures. It was at a little later period that 
the Due de Chartres authorized the establishment 
of the cafes and restaurants which for a couple 
of generations became the most celebrated ren- 
dezvous in Paris — the Cafe de Foy, the Cafe de 
la Paix, the Cafe Carrazzo and various other 
places of reunion whose very names, to say noth- 
ing of the incidents connected therewith, have 
come down to history. 

;It was the establishment of these public ren- 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 141 

dezvous which contributed so largely to the 
events which unrolled themselves in the Palais 
Royal in 1789. This "Eden de I'Enfer/* as it 
was known, has in late years been entirely recon- 
structed; the old haunts of the Empire have gone 
and nothing has come to take their place. 

Then came another class of establishments 
which burned brilliantly in the second rank and 
were, in a way, political rendezvous also — the 
Cafe de Chartres and the Cafe de Valois. Of 
all these Palais Royal cafes of the early nine- 
teenth century the most gorgeous and brilliant 
was the Cafe des Mille Colonnes, though its 
popularity was seemingly due to the charms of 
the maitresse de la maison, a Madame Romain, 
whose husband was a dried-up, dwarfed little 
man of no account whatever. Madame Romain, 
however, lived well up to her reputation as being 
^' incontestablement la plus jolie jemme de Parish 
By 1824 the fame of the establishment had be- 
gun to wane and in 1826 it expired, though the 
^^ Almanack des Gourmands ^^ of the latter year said 
that the proprietor was the Very of limonadiers, 
that his ices were superb, his salons magnificent — 
and his prices exorbitant. Perhaps it was the 
latter that did it! 

Another establishment, founded in 181 7, was 
domiciled here, the clients being served by ''oda- 



142 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

lisques en costume oriental ^ tres seduisantes.^^ This 
is quoted from the advertisements of the day. 
The cafe was called the Cafe des Circassiennes, 
and there was a sultane, who was the presiding 
genius of the place. It met with but an indifferent 
success and soon closed its doors despite its sup- 
posedly all-compelling attractions. 

Tn the mid-nineteenth century a revolution 
came over the cafes of Paris. Tobacco had in- 
vaded their precincts; previously one smoked 
only in the estaminets. Three cafes of the Palais 
Royal resisted the innovation, the Cafe de la 
Galerie d' Orleans, the Cafe de Foy and the Cafe 
de la Rotonde. To-day, well, to-day things are 
different. 

'The Theatre du Palais Royal of to-day was 
the Theatre des Marionettes of the Comte de 
Beaujolais, which had for contemporaries the 
Fantoches Italiens, the Ombres Chinoises and the 
Musee Curtius, perhaps the first of the wax- 
works shows that in later generations became 
so popular. The Palais Royal had now become 
a vast amusement enterprise, with side-shows 
of all sorts, theatres, concerts, cafes, restaurants, 
clubs, gambling-houses and what not — all pay- 
ing rents, and high ones, to the proprietor. 

In the centre of the garden, where is now the 
fountain and its basin, was a circus, half under- 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 143 

ground and half above, and there were innumer- 
able booths and kiosks for the sale of foolish 
trifles, all paying tribute to the ground landlord. 

^ Gaming at the Palais Royal was not wholly 
confined to the public gambling houses. During 
the carnival season of 1777 the gambling which 
went on in the royal apartments became notorious 
for even that profligate time : in one night the Due 
de Chartres lost eight thousand livres. Louis 
XVI, honest man, took all due precautions to 
reduce this extravagance, but was impotent. 

V Between the courtyard fountain and the northern 
arcade of the inner palace was placed the famous 
Cannon du Palais Royal, which, by an ingenious 
disposition, was fired each day at midday by the 
action of the sun's rays. All the world stood 
around awaiting the moment when watches might 
be regulated for another twenty-four hours. 

' The celebrated Abbe Delille, to whom the 
beauties of the gardens were being shown, de- 
plored the lack of good manners on the part of 
the habitues and delivered himself of the follow- 
ing appropriate quatrain: 

" Dans ce jardin tout se rencontr^e 
Excepte Tombrage et les fleurs; 
Si I'on y deregle ses moeurs 
Du moins on y regie sa montre." 

The Galerie de Bois was perhaps the most 



144 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

disreputable of all the palace confines. It was 
a long, double row of booths which only dis- 
appeared when Louis-Philippe built the glass- 
covered Galerie d' Orleans. 

Up to the eve of the Revolution the Palais 
Royal enjoyed the same privileges as the Temple 
and the Luxembourg, and became a sort of refuge 
whereby those who sought to escape from the 
police might lose themselves in the throng. The 
monarch himself was obliged to ask permission 
of the Due d' Orleans that his officials might pur- 
sue their police methods within the outer walls. 
' It was July 12, 1789. The evening before, 
Louis XVI had dismissed his minister, Neckar, 
but only on Sunday, the 12th, did the news get 
abroad. At the same time it was learned that the 
regiment known as the Royal AUemand, under 
the orders of the Prince de Lambesc, had charged 
the multitude gathered before the gates of the 
Tuileries. Cries of ''A Mort!" '^Aux Armes!'' 
"Vengeance!" were hurled in air from all sides. 

At high noon in the gardens of the Palais Royal, 
on the 13th, as the midday sun was scorching the 
flagstones to a grilling temperature, the sound of 
a tiny cannon shot smote the still summer air 
with an echo which did not cease reverberating 
for months. The careless, unthinking prom- 
enaders suddenly grew grave, then violently 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 145 

agitated and finally raving, heedlessly mad. A 
young unknown limb of the law, Camille Des- 
moulins, rushed bareheaded and shrieking out 
of the Cafe de Foy, parted the crowd as a ship 
parts the waves, sprang upon a chair and ha- 
rangued the multitude with such a vehemence 
and conviction that they were with him as one 
man. 

\ 'Citizens," he said, ''I come from Versailles 
* * * It only remains for us to choose our 
colours. Quelle coiileur voulez vous? Green, the 
colour of hope; or the blue of Cincinnati, the 
colour of American liberty and democracy." 

^'Nous avons assez delihere! Deliberate further 
with our hands not our hearts ! We are the party 
the most numerous: To arms!" 
\ On the morrow, the now famous 14th of July, 
the Frenchman's "glorious fourteenth," the peo- 
ple rose and the Bastille fell. 
• Revolutionary decree, in 1793, converted the 
palace and its garden into the Palais et Jardin 
de la Revolution, and appropriated them as 
national property. Napoleon granted the palace 
to the Tribunal for its seat, and during the 
Hundred Days Lucien Bonaparte took up his 
residence there. In 1830 Louis Philippe d'Orleans 
gave a great fete here in honour of the King of 
Naples who had come to the capital to pay his 



146 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

respects to the French king. Charles X, assist- 
ing at the ceremony as an invited guest, was 
also present and a month later came again to 
actually inhabit the palace and make it royal once 
more. 

The table herewith showing the ramifications of 
the Bourbon Orleans family in modern times is 
interesting — all collateral branches of the gene- 







under JVoLpofeon ^i'rs&r 



alogical tree sprouting from that of Louis Philippe. 
The heraldic embellishments of this family tree 
offer a particular interest in that the armorial 
blazonings are in accord with a decree of the 
French Tribunal, handed down a few years since, 
which establishes the right to the head of the 
house to bear the ecu plein de France — d'azur 
a trois fleurs de lys d^or, thus establishing the 
Orleans legitimacy. 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 147 

\ The Republic of 1848 made the palace the 
headquarters of the Cour des Comptes and of 
the Etat Major of the National Guard. Under 
Napoleon III the Palais Royal became the 
dwelling of Prince Jerome, the uncle of the 
emperor. Later it served the same purpose 
for the son of Prince Napoleon. It was at this 
epoch that the desecration of scraping out the 
blazoned lys and the chipping off the graven 
Bourbon arjnoiries took place. Whenever one 
or the other hated Bourbon symbol was found, 
eagles, phcenix-like, sprang up in their place, only 
in their turn to disappear when the Republican 
device of '48 (now brought to light again). 
Liberie, Egalite, Fraternite — replaced them. 

During the Commune of 1870 a part of the 
left wing and the central pavilion suffered by 
fire, but restorations under the architect, Cha- 
brol, brought them back again to much their orig- 
inal outlines. Through all its changes of tenure 
and political vicissitudes little transformation 
took place as to the ground plan, or sky-line 
silhouette, of the chameleon palace of cardinal, 
king and emperor, and while in no sense is it 
architecturally imposing or luxurious, it is now, 
as ever in the past, one of the most distinctive 
of Paris 's public monuments. 

To-day the Palais Royal proper may be said 



148 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

to face on Place du Palais Royal, with its prin- 
cipal entrance at the end of a shallow courtyard 
separated from the street by an iron grille and 
flanked by two unimposing pavilions. The prin- 
cipal facade hides the lodging of the Conseil 
d'Etat and is composed of but the ground floor, 
a story above and an attic. 
\The Aile Montpensier, which follows on from 
the edifice which houses the Comedie Franjaise, 
was, until recently, occupied by the Cour des 
Comptes. The Aile de Valois fronts the street 
of that name, and here the Princes d' Orleans 
and King Jerome made their residence. To- 
day the same wing is devoted to the uses of the 
Under Secretary for the Beaux Arts. 

It is not necessary to insist on, nor reiterate, 
the decadence of the Palais Royal. It is no 
longer the "capitol of Paris," and whatever its 
charms may be they are mostly equivocal. It is 
more a desert than an oasis or a temple de la 
volupte, and it was each of these things in 
other days. Its priestesses and its gambling 
houses are gone, and who shall say this of itself 
is not a good thing in spite of the admitted void. 

The mediocrity of the Palais Royal is apparent 
to all who have the slightest acquaintance with the 
architectural orders, but for all that its transition 
from the Palais du Cardinal, Palais Egalite, 



Palais Cardinal and Palais Royal 149 

Palais de la Revolution and Palais du Tribimat 
to the Palais Royal lends to it an interest that 
many more gloriously artistic Paris edifices quite 
lack. 

There is a movement on foot to-day to resur- 
rect the Palais Royal to some approach to its 
former distinction, which is decidedly what it has 
not been for the past quarter of a century. Satir- 
ical persons have demanded as to what should 
be made of it. a velodrome or a skating-rink, 
but this is apart from a real consideration of 
the question for certain it is that much of its 
former charm can be restored to it without turn- 
ing it into a Luna Park. It is one of the too few 
Paris breathing-spots, and as such should be 
made more attractive than it is at the present 
time. 
" It was sixty years ago, when Louis Philippe 
was the legitimate owner of the Palais Royal, its 
galleries, its shops, its theatre and its gardens, 
that it came to its first debasement. ^'One went 
there on tip-toe, and spoke in a whisper," said a 
writer of the time, and one does not need to be 
particularly astute to see the significance of the 
remark. 

It was Alphonse Karr, the ecrivmn-jardiniery 
who set the new vogue for the Palais Royal, but 
his interest and enthusiasm was not enough to 



150 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

resurrect it, and so in later years it has sunk lower 
and lower. The solitude of the Palais Royal 
has become a mockery and a solecism. It is 
virtually a campo santo, or could readily be made 
one, and this in spite of the fact that it occupies 
one of the busiest and noisiest quarters of the 
capital, a quadrangle bounded by the Rues Valois, 
Beaujolais, Montpensier and the Place du Palais 
Royal. 

The moment one enters its portal the simile 
accentuates and the hybrid shops which sell such 
equivocal bric-a-brac to clients of no taste and 
worse affectations carry out the idea of a cloister 
still further, for actually the clients are few, and 
those mostly strangers. One holds his breath 
and ambles through the corridors glad enough 
to escape the bustle of the narrow streets which 
surround it, but, on the other hand, glad enough 
to get out into the open again. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE LUXEMBOURG, THE ELYSEE AND THE 
PALAIS BOURBON 

The kings and queens of France were not 
only rulers of the nation, but they dominated 
the life of the capital as well. Upon their crown- 
ing or entry into Paris it was the custom to com- 
mand a gift by right from the inhabitants. In 
1389 Isabeau de Baviere, of dire memory, got 
sixty thousand cour mines d^or, and in 1501, and 
again in 1504, was presented with six thousand 
and ten thousand livres parisis respectively. 

The king levied personal taxes on the inhabit- 
ants, who were thus forced to pay for the privilege 
of having him live among them, those of the 
professions and craftsmen, who might from time 
to time serve the royal household, paying the 
highest fees. 

It was during the period of Richelieu's ministry 
that Paris flowered the most profusely. The 
constructions of this epoch were so numerous 
and imposing that Corneille in his comedy *'Le 
Menteur," first produced in 1642, made his 
characters speak thus: 

151 



152 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

Dorante: Paris semble k mes yeux un pays de roman 
******* 

En superbes palais a change ses buissons 
******* 

Aux superbes dehors du palais Cardinal 

Tout la ville entiere, avec pomp batie 
******* 

In 1 701, Louis XIV divided the capital into 
twenty quartiers, or wards, and in 1 726-1 728 
Louis XV built a new city wall; but it was only 
with Louis XVI that the faubourgs were at last 
brought within the city limits. Under the Em- 
pire and the Restoration but few changes were 
made, and with the piercing of the new boule- 
vards under Napoleon III and Baron Haussmann 
the city came to be of much the same general 
plan that it is to-day. 

\In the olden time, between the Palais de la 
Cite and the Louvre and the Palais des Tour- 
nelles, extending even to the walls of Charenton, 
was a gigantic garden, a carpet embroidered 
with as varied a colouring as the tapis d^ orient of 
the poets, and cut here and there by alleys which 
separated it into little checker-board squares. 

Within this maze was the celebrated Jardin 
Dedalus that Louis XI gave to Coictier, and above 
it rose the observatory of the savant like a signal 
tower of the Romans. This centered upon what 
is now the Place des Vosges, formerly the Place 
Royale. 



Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 153 

To-day, how changed is all this "intermediate, 
indeterminate" region! How changed, indeed! 
There is nothing vague and indeterminate about 
it to-day. 

The earliest of the little known Paris palaces 
was the Palais des Thermes. It may be dis- 
missed almost in a word from any consideration 
of the royal dwellings of Paris, though it was 
the residence of several Roman emperors and 
two queens of France. A single apartment 
of the old palace of the Romans exists to-day 
— the old Roman Baths — but nothing of the 
days of the Emperor Constantius Chlorus, who 
founded the palace in honour of Julian who was 
proclaimed Emperor by his soldiers in 360 a.d. 
The Prankish monarchs, if they ever resided 
here at all, soon transferred their headquarters 
to the Palais de la Cite, the ruins falling into the 
possession of the monks of Cluny, who built 
the present Hotel de Cluny on the site. 
' Of all the minor French palaces the Luxem- 
bourg and the Elysee are the most often heard 
of in connection with the life of modern times. 
The first is something a good deal more than an 
art museum, and the latter more than the residence 
fo the Republican president, though the guide- 
book makers hardly think it worth while to write 
down the facts. 



154 Roy al Palaces and Parks of France 

The Palais du Luxembourg has been called 
an imitation of the Pitti Palace at Florence, but, 
beyond the fact that it was an Italian conception 
of Marie de Medici's, it is difficult to follow the 
suggestion, as the architect, Jacques Debrosse, 
one of the ablest of Frenchmen in his line, simply 
carried out the work on the general plan of the 
time of its building, the early seventeenth century. 

Its three not very extensive pavilions are joined 
together by a colonnade which encloses a rather 
foreboding flagged courtyard, a conception, or 
elaboration, of the original edifice by Chalgrin, 
in 1804, under the orders of Napoleon. The 
garden front, though a restoration of Louis 
Philippe, is more in keeping with the original 
Medici plan; that, at any rate, is to its credit. 

To-day the Luxembourg, the Republican Palais 
du Senat, is but an echo of the four centuries 
of aristocratic existence which upheld the name 
and fame of its first proprietor, the Due de^iney- 
Luxembourg, Prince de Tigry, who built it in 
the sixteenth century. From 1733 to 1736 Hie 
palace underwent important restorations and 
the last persons to inhabit it before the Revolu- 
tion were the Duchesse de Brunswick, the Queen 
Dowager of Spain and the Comte de Provence, 
brother of Louis XVI, to whom it had been given 
by Letters Patent in 1779. 



Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 155 

In 1 791 the Convention thought so little of 
it that they made it a prison, and a few years 
later it was called again the Palais du Directoire, 
and, before the end of the century, the Palais 
du Consulat. This was but a brief glory, as 
Napoleon transferred his residence in accordance 
with his augmenting ambitions, to the Tuileries 
in the following year. 

By 1870 the edifice had become known as the 

/ Palais du Senat, then as the headquarters of the 

'^ Prefecture of the Seine, and finally, as to-day, 
the Palais du Luxembourg, the seat of the French 
Senate and the residence of the president of that 
body. 

The principal public apartments are the Library, 
the *^ Salle des Seances, '^ the "Buvette" — for- 
merly Napoleon's *^ Cabinet de Travail," the 
*^ Salle des Pas Perdus" — formerly the "Salle 
du Trone," the Grand Gallery and the apart- 
ments of Marie de Medici. The chapel is 
modern and dates only from 1844. 

^ The Palais du Petit Luxembourg is the official 
residence of the president of the Senate and 

, dates also from the time of Marie de Medici. 
The picture gallery is housed in a modern struc- 
ture to the west of the Petit Luxembourg. 

The facade of the Palais du Senat is not al- 
together lovely and has little suggestion of the 



156 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 








o 






Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 157 

daintiness of the Petit Luxembourg, but, for all 
that, it presents a certain dignified pose and 
the edifice serves its purpose well as the legisla- 
tive hall of the upper house. 

The gardens of the Luxembourg form another 
of those favourite Paris playgrounds for nurse- 
maids and their charges. It is claimed that 
the children are all little Legitimists in the Luxem- 
bourg gardens, whereas they are all Red Re- 
publicans at the Tuileries. One has no means 
of knowing this with certainty, but it is assumed; 
at any rate the Legitimists are a very numerous 
class in the neighbourhood. Another class of 
childhood to be seen here is that composed of 
the offsprings of artists and professors of the 
Latin quarter, and of the active tradesmen of 
the neighbourhood. They come here, like the 
others, for the fresh air, to see a bit of greenery, 
to hear the band play, to sail their boats in the 
basins of the great fountain and enjoy themselves 
generally. 

One notes a distinct difference in the dress 
and manners of the children of the gardens of 
the Luxembourg from those of the Tuileries 
and wonders if the breach will be widened further 
as they grow up. 

The Jardin du Luxembourg is all that a great 
city garden should be, ample, commodious, 



158 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

decorative and as thoroughly typical of Paris 
as the Pont Neuf. Innumerable, but rather 
mediocre, statues are posed here and there be- 
tween the palace and the observatory at the end 
of the long, tree-lined avenue which stretches 
off to the south, the only really historical monu- 
ment of this nature being the celebrated Fontaine 
de Medicis by Debrosse, the architect of the 
palace. It was a memorial to Marie de Medici. 

While one is in this quarter of Paris he has 
an opportunity to recall a royal memory now 
somewhat dimmed by time, but still in evidence 
if one would delve deep. 

As a matter of fact, royalty never had much 
to do with this hybrid quarter of Paris, though, 
indeed, its past was romantic enough, bordering 
as it does upon the real Latin Quarter of the 
students. Bounded on one side by the immense 
domain of the Luxembourg, it stretched away 
indefinitely beyond Vaugiraud, almost to Clamart 
and Sceaux. 

At No. 27 Boulevard Montparnasse is an elab- 
orate seventeenth house-front half hidden by 
the "modern style" flats of twentieth century 
Paris. This relic of the grand siecle, with its 
profusion of sculptured details, was the house 
bought by Louis XIV about 1672 and given to 
the "widow Scarron," the "young and beauti- j 

i 



158 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



tasss 



(iecorative and as than 



mediocre, statues are 

tween the 



: ileal of Paris 

c, but rather 

re and there be- 

. vatory at the end 

which stretches 

historical monu- 

celebrated Fontaine 

he architect of the 

'\.si to Marie de Medici. 

aarter of Paris he has 

to ixcaii a royal memory now 

cd by time^ but still in evidence 

acive deep. 

- ' *^ royalty never had much 

nnnrter of Paris, though, 

u, iib^pk^^-d^mflm^lrJi-'aA^h, bordering 

• ^^oes upon the real latin Quarter of the 

one side by the immense 
^.i^rrr }f strctched away 



>, t^ >."l rwy 



indefinite!} 


• vwV;.;! to Clamart 


and Seep ' 




^ At X ^ ........ . .,.„ 


an elab- 


. nteenth h- 


nt half hidden by 


:;^odern s^vh^' 


'h century 


'Thh 


with its 




iouse 




given to 




;ung and beauti 



Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 159 

ful widow of the court," as a recompense for 
the devotion with which she had educated the 
three children of the Marquise de Montespan, 
who, in 1673, were legitimatized as princes of 
the royal house — the Due de Maine, the Comte 
de Vexin and Mademoiselle de Mantes. 

\ Madame Scarron, who became in time Madame 
de Maintenon, the ^'vraie reine du roij^^ died in 
1 7 19, and the house passed to La Tour d'Auvergne. 
On this same side of the river are the Palais 
de V Institut and the Palais Bourbon. The 
Palais de 1' Institut, or Palais Mazarin, is hardly 
to be considered one of the domestic establish- 
ments, the dwellings of kings, with which con- 
temporary Paris was graced. It was but a crea- 
tion of Mazarin, the minister, on the site of 
the Hotel de Nesle, and was first known as the 
Palais des Quatre Nations, where were educated, 
at the expense of the Cardinal, sixty young men 
of various nationalities. 

'^ The old chapel has since been transformed 
into the *' Salle des Seances" of the Institut de 
France, the Five French Academies. The black, 
gloomy fa^iade of the edifice, to-day, in spite of 
the cupola which gives a certain inspiring dignity, 
is not lovely, and tradition and sentiment alone 
give it its present interest, though it is undeniably 
picturesque. 



160 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

An inscription used to be on the pedestal of 

one of the fountains opposite the entrance which 

read: 

" Superbe habitant du desert 
En ce lieu, dis moi, que fais tu 
— Tu le vois a mon habit vert 
Je suis membre de Pinstitut." 

If the inscription were still there it would save 
the asking of a lot of silly questions by strangers 
who pass this way for the first time. The Palais 
de r Institut is one of the sights of Paris, and its 
functions are notable, though hardly belonging 
to the romantic school of past days, for at present 
poets often make their entree via Montmartre's 
''Chat Noir, " or are elected simply because 
some other candidate has been '^blackbouled.^^ 

Still following along the left bank of the Seine 
one comes to the Palais Bourbon, the Chambre 
des Deputes, as it is better known. This edi- 
fice, where now sit the French deputies, was built 
by Girardini for the Dowager Duchesse de Bour- 
bon in 1722, and, though much changed during 
various successive eras, is still a unique variety of 
architectural embellishment which is not uncouth, 
nor yet wholly appealing. Napoleon remade 
the heavily imposing facade, so familiar to all 
who cross the river by the Pont de la Concorde, 
but its grimness is its charm rather than its grace. 



Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 161 



The structure cost its first proprietor twenty 
million or more francs, and since it has become 
national property the outlay has been constant. 
Everything considered it makes a poor showing; 
but its pseudo- Greek facade, were it removed, 
would certainly be missed in this section of Paris. 

The principal apartments are the "Salle des 
Pas Perdus," the 
"Salle des Se- 
ances,'' and the 
" Salle des Confer- 
ences" — where, 
in 1830, the Due 
d'Orleans took 
the oath as king 
of France. 
X A recent dis- 
covery has been 
made in the lum- 
ber room of this 
old Palais Bour- 
bon, where deputies howl and shout and make 
laws as noisily as in any other of the world's 
parliaments. 

This particular "find" was the throne con- 
structed in 1 81 6 for Louis XVIII, with its upholster- 
ing of velvet embroidered with the golden fleur-de- 
lis. The records tell that this throne also served 




of t6e 
T=>AI-AJ3 — ©OU^CBON 



162 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Louis Philippe under the Second Empire, and also 
was used under the Monarchy of July. It was after 
the momentous "Quatre Setembre" that it was 
finally relegated to the garret, but now, as a histori- 
cal souvenir of the first rank, it has been placed 
prominently where all who visit the Palais Bour- 
bon may see it. 

^The history of the Palais de FElysee has not 
been particularly vivid, though for two centuries 
it has played a most important part in the life 
of the capital. In later years it has served weU 
enough the presidential dignity of the chief 
magistrate of the French Republic and is thus 
classed as a national property. Actually, since 
its construction, it has changed its name as often 
as it has changed its occupants. Its first occu- 
pant was its builder, Louis d'Auvergne, Comte 
d'Evreux, who built himself this great town 
house on a plot of land which had been given 
him by Louis XV. Apparently the young man 
had no means of his own for the construction 
of his luxurious city dwelling, for he refilled his 
coffers by marriage with the rich daughter of 
the financier Crozat. 

The new-made countess's mother-in-law ap- 
parently never had much respect for her son's 
choice as she forever referred to her as "the 
little gold ingot." 



Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 163 

^ "The ingot" served to construct the palace, 
however, though at the death of its builder, soon 
after, it came into the proprietorship of La Pom- 
padour, who spent the sum of six hundred and 
fifty thousand livres in aggrandizing it. It be- 
came her town house, whither she removed 
when she grew tired of Versailles or Bagatelle. 
^History tells of an incident in connection with 
a fete given at the Palais de T Elysee by La Pom- 
padour. It was at the epoch of the ^^bergeries 
a la Watteau.^' The blond Pompadour had the 
idea of introducing into the salons a troop of 
living, sad-eyed sheep, combed and curled like 
the poodles in the carriages of the fashionables 
in the Bois to-day. The quadrupeds, greatly 
frightened by the flood of light, fell into a panic, 
and the largest ram among them, seeing his 
duplicate in a mirror, made for it in the tradi- 
tional ram-like manner. He raged for an hour 
or more from one apartment to another, followed 
by the whole flock, which committed incalcul- 
able damage before it could be turned into the 
gardens. Such was one of the costly caprices 
of La Pompadour. She had many. 

La Pompadour's brother, the Marquis de 
Menars et de Marigny, continued the work of 
embellishment of the property up to the day 
when Louis XV bought it as a dwelling for the 



164 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

ambassadors to his court. Its somewhat re- 
stricted park, ornamented with a grotto and a 
cascade, was at this time one of the curiosities 
of the capital. 

In 1773, the financier Beau j on bought the 
property from the king and added considerably 
to it under the direction of the architect Boullee, 
who also re-designed the gardens. Thanks to 
Beaujon, the wonderful Gobelins of to-day were 
hung upon the walls, and many paintings by 
Rubens, Poissin, Van Loo, Von Ostade, Murillo, 
Paul Potter and Joseph Vernet were added. 

The death of the financier brought the prop- 
erty into the hands of the Duchesse de Bourbon, 
the sister of Louis Philippe, and the mother of 
the Due d' Enghien, who died so tragically at 
Vincennes a short time after. The duchess 
renamed her new possession Elysee-Bourbon 
and there led a very retired and sad life among 
surroundings so splendid that they merited a 
more gay existence. 

At the Revolution the palace became a national 
property, and, under the Consulate, was the scene 
of many popular fetes, it having been rented 
to a concern which arranged balls and other 
entertainments for the pleasure of all who could 
afford to pay. Its name was now the Hameau 
de Chantilly, and, considering that the entrance 



Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 165 

tickets cost but fifteen sous — including a drink 
— it must have proved a cheap, satisfying and 
splendid amusement for the people. 

This state of affairs lasted until 1805, when 
Murat bought it and here held his little court 
up to his departure for Naples, when, in grate- 
fulness for past favours, he gave it to Napoleon. 
The emperor greatly loved this new abode, which 
he rechristened the Elysee-Napoleon. 

After his defeat at Waterloo Napoleon, limp- 
ing lamely Parisward, down through the Forests 
of Compiegne and Villers-Cotterets, sought in 
the Elysee-Napoleon the repose and rest which 
he so much needed, the throng meanwhile prom- 
enading before the palace windows, shouting 
at the tops of their voices "Vive I'Empereur!" 
though, as the world well knew, his power had 
waned forever; the eagle's wings were broken. 
The throng still crowded the precincts of the 
palace, but the emperor fled secretly by the 
garden gate. 

^ On the return of the Duchesse de Bourbon 
from Spain the magnificent structure became 
again the Elysee- Bourbon. The duchess ceded 
the palace to the Due and Duchesse de Berry 
but, at the duke's death, in 1820, his widow 
abandoned it. 

Some time after it was occupied by the Due 



166 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

de Bordeaux, and, in 1830, it became one of the 
long list of establishments whose maintenance 
devolved upon the Civil List, though it remained 
practically uninhabited all through the reign of 
Louis Philippe. 

^ In 1848, the National Assembly designated 
the palace as the official residence for the presi- 
dents of the French Republic. Three years 
after, on the night of the first of December, as 
the last preparations were being made by Louis 
Bonaparte for the Coup d' Etat and the final 
strangling of the young republic, the residence 
of the president was transferred to the Tuileries, 
and the palace of the Faubourg Saint Honore 
was again left without a tenant, and served only 
to give hospitality from time to time to passing 
notables. 

\ After the burning of the Tuileries, and the 
coming of the Third Republic, the Elysee Palace 
again became the presidential residence, and so 
it remains to-day. 

One of the most notable of modern events 
connected with the Elysee Palace was the diner 
de ceremonie offered by the president of the 
Republic and Madame Fallieres to Mr. and Mrs. 
Roosevelt in April, 19 10. The dinner was served 
in the ''Grand Salle des Fetes" and the music 
which accompanied the repast was furnished 



Luxembourg, Elysee, Palais Bourbon 167 

by the band of the Garde Republicain, beginning 
with the national anthem of America and finish- 
ing with that of France. Never had a private 
citizen, a foreigner, been so received by the first 
magistrate of France. The toast of President 
Fallieres was as follows: '^Before this repast 
terminates I wish to profit by the occasion offered 
to drink the health of Monsieur Theodore Roose- 
velt, an illustrious man, a great citizen and a 
good friend of France and the cause of peace. 
I raise my glass to Madame Roosevelt who may 
be assured of our respectful and sympathetic 
homage, and I am very glad to be able to say 
to our guests that we count ourselves very for- 
tunate in being allowed to meet them in person 
and show them this mark of respect." 



CHAPTER X 

VINCENNES AND CONFLANS 




ViNCENNES is to-day little more than a dull, 
dirty Paris suburb; if anything its complexion is 
a deeper drab than that of Saint Denis, and to 
call the Bois de Vincennes a park "somewhat 
resembling the Bois de Boulogne," as do the 
guidebooks, is ridiculous. 

In reality Vincennes is nothing at all except a 
memory. There is to-day little suggestion of 
royal origin about the smug and murky surround- 
ings of the Chateau de Vincennes; but never- 
theless, it once was a royal residence, and the 
drama which unrolled itself within its walls was 
most vividly presented. A book might be written 
upon it, with the following as the chapter head- 
ings: "The Royal Residence," "The Minimes of 

168 



Vincennes and Conflans 169 

the Bois de Vincennes," "Mazarin at Vincennes," 
^'The Prisoners of the Donjon," "The Fetes of 
the Revolution," "The Death of the Due d'Eng- 
hien," "The Transformation of the Chateau and 
the Bois." 

Its plots are ready-made, but one has to take 
them on hearsay, for the old chateau does not 
open its doors readily to the stranger for the 
reason that it to-day ranks only as a military 
fortress, and an artillery camp is laid out in 
the quadrangle, intended, if need be, to aid in 
the defence of Paris. This is one of the things 
one hears about, but of which one may not have 
any personal knowledge. 

The first reference to the name of Vincennes 
is in a ninth century charter, where it appears 
as Vilcenna. The foundation of the original 
chateau-fort on the present site is attributed to 
Louis VII, who, in 1164, having alienated a part 
of the neighbouring forest in favour of a body of 
monks, built himself a suburban rest-house under 
shelter of the pious walls of their convent. 

Philippe Auguste, too, has been credited with 
being the founder of Vincennes ; but, at all events, 
the chateau took on no royal importance until 
the reign of Saint Louis, who acquired the habit 
of dispensing justice to all comers seated beneath 
an oak in the nearby Forest of JoinviUe, 



170 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The erection of the later chateau was begun by 
Charles, Comte de Valois, brother of Philippe- 
le-Bel; and it was completed by Philippe VI of 
Valois, and his successor, Jean-le-Bon, between 
the years 1337 and 1370, when it became an 
entirely new manner of edifice from what it had 
been before. It was in this chateau that was 
born Charles V, to whom indeed it owes its com- 
pletion in the form best known. 

To-day, the outlines of the mass of the Chateau 
de Vincennes are considerably abbreviated from 
their former state. Originally it was quite regu- 
lar in outline, its walls forming a rectangle flanked 
by nine towers, the great donjon which one sees 
to-day occupying the centre of one side. The 
chapel was begun in the reign of Francois I and 
terminated in that of Henri II. Its coloured glass, 
painted by Jean Cousin from the designs of 
Raphael, is notable. 

The chapel at Vincennes, with the Saint 
Chapelle of the Palais de Justice at Paris, ranks 
as one of the most exquisite examples extant of 
French Gothic architecture. It was begun in 
1379, but chiefly it is of the sixteenth century, 
since it was only completed in 1552. This chapel 
of the sixteenth century, and the two side wings 
flanking the tower of the reign of Louis XIV, 
make the Chateau de Vincennes a most precious 



Vincennes and Conflans 171 

specimen of mediaeval ecclesiastical and military 
architecture. If Napoleon had not cut down the 
height of the surrounding walls the comparison 
would be still more favourable. In the reproduc- 
tion of the miniature from the Book of Hours of 
the Due de Berry given herein one sees the per- 
fect outlines of the fourteenth century edifice. 

In later years, Louis XIII added considerably 
to the existing structure, but little is now to be 
seen of that edifice save the great tower and the 
chapel. 

Charles IX, whose royal edict brought forth 
the bloody night of Saint Bartholomew in 1572, 
fell sick two years later in the Chateau de Vin- 
cennes. Calling his surgeon, Ambroise Pare, 
to his side he exclaimed: "My body burns with 
fever; I see the mangled Huguenots all about 
me; Holy Virgin, how they mock me; I wish. 
Pare, I had spared them." And thus he died, 
abhorring the mother who had counselled him 
to commit this horrible deed. 

The donjon of Vincennes was carried to its 
comparatively great height that it might serve as 
a tower of observation as well as a place of last 
retreat if in an attack the outer walls of the for- 
tress should give way. Here at Vincennes a cer- 
tain massiveness is noted in connection with the 
donjon, though the actual ground area which it 



172 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



covers is not very great; it was not like many- 
donjons of the time, which were virtually smaller 
chateaux or fortresses enclosed within a greater. 

Vincennes, in comparison with many other 
contemporary edifices, possessed a certain regu- 
larity of outline which was made possible by its 
favourable situation. When others were of fantastic 
form, they were usually so built because of the 
configuration of the land, or the nature of the soil. 
But here the land was flat, and, though the edifice 
and its dependencies covered no very extended 
area, they followed rectangular lines with abso- 
lute precision. 

As its walls were of a thickness of three metres, 
it was a work easy of accomplishment for Louis 
XI to turn the chateau into a Prison of State, 
a use to which the first chateau had actually been 
put by the shutting up in it of Enguerrand de 
Marigny. Henri IV, in 1574, passed some soli- 
tary hours and days within its walls, and Mira- 
beau did the same in 1777. The Due d'Enghien, 
under the First Empire, before his actual death 
by shooting, suffered sorely herein, while resting 
under an unjust suspicion. 

Ini8i4-i8i5 the chateau became a great arsenal 
and general storehouse for the army. It was at- 
tacked by the Allies and besieged twice, but in 
vain. It was defended against the armies of 




;_ JTm;;?^., 







:?S^ 




Chateau de Vincennes 



Vincennes and Conflans 173 

Blucher by the Baron Daumesnil. Summoned 
to surrender his charge, "Jambe de Bois" (so 
called because he had lost a leg the year be- 
fore) replied: "I will surrender when you sur- 
render to me my leg." A statue to this brave 
warrior is within the chateau, and commem- 
orates further the fact that he capitulated only 
on terms laid down by himself out of his humane 
regard for the lives of friends and foes. 

The ministers of Charles X, in 1830, had cause 
to regret the strength of the chateau walls; and 
Barbes, Blanqui and Raspail, in 1848, and vari- 
ous Republicans, who had been seized as dan- 
gerous elements of society after the Coup d'Etat 
of 1 85 1, also here found an enforced hospitality. 
The Chateau de Vincennes had become a second 
Bastille. 

The incident of the arrest and death of the Due 
d'Enghien is one of the most dramatic in Napole- 
onic history. The scene was Vincennes. Louis 
Antoine Henri de Bourbon, son of the Prince 
de Conde, born at Chantilly in 1772, became, 
without just reason, suspected in connection with 
the Cadoudal-Pichegreu plot, and was seized by 
a squadron of cavalry at the Schloss Ettenheim in 
the Duchy of Baden and conducted to Vincennes. 
Here, after a summary judgment, he was shot at 
night in the moat behind the guardhouse. The 



174 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

obscurity of the night was so great that a Hghted 
lantern was hung around the neck of the un- 
fortunate man that the soldiers might the better 
see the mark at which they were to shoot. 

Napoleon confided to Josephine, who repeated 
the secret to Madame de Remusat, that his poHtical 
future demanded a coup d'Etat. On the morn- 
ing of the execution, the emperor, awakening at 
five o'clock, said to Josephine: *^By this time the 
Due d'Enghien has passed from this life." 

The rest is history — of that apologetic kind 
which is not often recorded. 

In the chapel at Vincennes a commemorative 
tablet was placed, by the orders of Louis XVIII, 
in 1816, to mark the death of the young duke. 

The Bois de Vincennes is not the fashionable 
parade ground of the Bois de Boulogne. On the 
whole it is a sad sort of a public park, and not at 
all fashionable, and not particularly attractive, 
though of a vast extent and possessed of a pro- 
foundly historic past of far more significance 
than that of its sweet sister by the opposite gates 
of Paris. 

It contains ten hundred and sixty-nine hectares 
and was due originally to Louis XV, who sought 
to have a sylvan gateway to the city from the east. 
Under the Second Empire the park was con- 
siderably transformed, new roads and alleys 




A Hunt under the Walls of Vincennes 

From a Fourteenth Century J^rtnt 



Vincennes and Conflans 175 

traced, and an effort made to have it equal more 
nearly the beauty of the more popular Bois de 
Boulogne. It occupies the plateau l3ang between 
the Seine and the bend in the Marne, just above 
'the junction of the two rivers. 

There are some forty kilometres of roadway 
within the limits of the Bois de Vincennes, and a 
dozen kilometres or more of footpaths; but, since 
the military authorities have taken a portion for 
their own uses as a training ground, a shooting 
range and for the Batteries of La Faisanderie and 
Gravelle, it has been bereft of no small part of its 
former charm. There are three lakes in the Bois, 
the Lac de Sainte Mande, the Lac Daumesnil 
and the Lac de Gravelle. 

A near neighbour of Vincennes is Conflans, 
another poor, rent relic of monarchial majesty. 
The Chateau de Conflans was situated at the 
juncture of the Seine and Marne, but, to-day, 
the immediate neighbourhood is so very unlovely 
and depressing that one can hardly believe that 
it ever pleased any one's fancy, least of all that 
of a kingly castle builder. 

Banal dwellings on all sides are Conflans' chief 
characteristics to-day; but the old royal abode 
still lifts a long length of roof and wall to mark 
the spot where once stood the Chateau de Con- 
flans in all its glory. 



176 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Conflans was at first the country residence of 
the Archbishops of Paris, and Saint Louis fre- 
quently went into retreat here. When Phihppe- 
le-Bel acquired the property, he promptly gave it 
to the Comtesse d'Artois who made of it one of 
the ^^ plus beaux castels du temps. " She decorated 
its long gallery, the portion of the edifice which 
exists to-day in the humble, emasculated form 




of a warehouse of some sort, in memory of her 
husband Othon. Here the countess held many 
historic receptions and ceremonies during which 
kings and princes frequently partook of her hos- 
pitality. 

After the death of the countess, the French 
king made his residence at Conflans, and Charles 
VT, when dauphin, was also lodged here that he 
might be near the capital in case of events which 



Vincennes and Conflans 177 

might require his presence. A contemporary 
account mentions the fact that his valet de chambre 
was killed by lightning at Conflans while serving 
his royal master. 

Conflans was the preferred suburban residence 
of the Princes and the Dues de Bourgogne, and 
Philippe-le-Hardi there organized his tourneys 
and his passes d'armes with great eclat, on one 
occasion alone offering one hundred and fifteen 
thousand livres in prizes to the participants. 

This castle, for it was more castle than palace, 
was reputed one of the most magnificent in the 
neighbourhood of the Paris of its time, surrounded 
as it was with a resplendent garden and a forest 
in miniature, really a part of the Bois de Vin- 
cennes of to-day, where roamed wild boar and 
wolves which furnished sport of a kingly kind. 

The view from the terrace of the chateau must 
have been wonderfully fine, the towers and roof- 
tops of old Paris being silhouetted against the set- 
ting sun, its windows dominating the swift-flowing 
current of the two rivers at the foot of the fortress 
walls. 

The greatest event of history enacted under 
the walls of Conflans was the battle and the treaty 
which followed after, between Louis XI and the 
Comte de Charolais, in 1405. 

Commynes recounts the battle as follows: "Four 



178 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

thousand archers were sent out from Paris by the 
king, who fired upon the castle from the river 
bank on both sides/' 

Bows and arrows were hardly effective weapons 
with which to shoot down castle walls, but strag- 
glers who left themselves unprotected were from 
time to time picked off on both sides and much 
carnage actually ensued. Finally a treaty of 
peace was arranged, by which, at the death of 
Charles-le-Temeraire, according to usage, Louis 
XI absorbed the proprietary rights in the castle 
and made it a Maison Royale, bestowing it upon 
one of his favourites. Dame Gillette Hennequin. 

The kings of France about this time developed 
a predilection for the chateaux on the banks of 
the Loire, and Conflans was offered for sale in 
1554. Divers personages occupied it from that 
time on, the Marechal de Villeroy, the Connetable 
de Montmorency and, for a brief time. Cardinal 
Richelieu. 

It was in the Chateau de Conflans that was 
planned the foundation of the French Academy; 
here Moliere and his players first presented "La 
Critique de I'Ecole des Femmes"; and here, also, 
was held the marriage of La Grande Mademoiselle 
with the unhappy Lauzan. 

At the end of the reign of Louis XIV Fr. de 
Harlay-Chauvallon, Archbishop of Paris, bought 



Vincennes and Conflans 179 

the property of Richelieu, and, with the aid of 
Mansart and Le Notre, considerably embellished 
it within and without. Madame de Sevigne, in 
one of her many published letters, writes of the 
splendours which she saw at Conflans at this 
epoch. 

Saint-Simon, the court chronicler, mentions 
that the gardens were so immaculately kept that 
when the Archbishop and "La Belle" Duchesse 
de Lesdiguieres used to promenade therein they 
were followed by a gardener who, with a rake, 
sought to remove the traces of each footprint as 
soon as made. 

Later, the Cardinal de Beaumont, the persecutor 
of the Jansenists, resided here. 

" Notre archeveque est a Conflans 
C'est im grand solitaire 
C'est un grand so 
C'est un grand so 
C'est un grand solitaire." 

The above verse is certainly banal enough, but 
the cardinal himself was a drble, so perhaps it is 
appropriate. At any rate it is contemporary with 
the churchman's sojourn at Conflans. 



CHAPTER XI 



rONTAINEBLEAU AND ITS FOREST 




ORIOINAX- PL. AN OF FOlvITAlNElBt^-EAU 



Of all the French royal palaces Fontainebleau 
is certainly the most interesting, despite the 
popularity and accessibility of Versailles. It 
is moreover the cradle of the French Renaissance. 
Napoleon called it the Maison des Siecles, and 
the simile was just. 

After Versailles, Fontainebleau has ever held 
the first place among the suburban royal palaces. 
The celebrated "Route de Fontainebleau" of 
history was as much a Chemin du Roi as that 
which led from the capital to Versailles. Ver- 

180 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 18 1 

sailles was gorgeous, even splendid, if you will ; but 
it had not the unique characteristics, nor winsome- 
ness of Fontainebleau, nor ever will have, in the 
minds of those who know and love the France 
of monarchial days. 

Not the least of the charm of Fontainebleau 
is the neighbouring forest so close at hand, a few 
garden railings, not more, separating the palace 
from one of the wildest forest tracts of modern 
France. 

The Forest of Fontainebleau is full of memories 
of royal rendezvous, the carnage of wild beasts, 
the ^^vraie image de la guerre ^^^ of which the 
Renaissance kings were so inordinately fond. 

It was from the Palace of Fontainebleau, too, 
chat bloomed forth the best and most whole- 
some of the French Renaissance architecture. 
It was the model of all other later residences of 
its kind. It took the best that Italy had to offer 
and developed something so very French that 
even the Italian workmen, under the orders 
of Francois I, all but lost their nationality. Vasari 
said of it that it ^'rivalled the best work to be 
found in the Rome of its time.'' 

A charter of Louis-le-Jeune (Louis VII), dated 
at Fontainebleau in 1169, attests that the spot 
was already occupied by a mats on royale which, 
according to the Latin name given in the docu- 



182 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

ment, was called Fontene Bleaudi, an etymol- 
ogy not difficult to trace when what we know 
of its earlier and later history is considered. 

Actually this jontaine belle eau is found to-day 
in the centre of the Jardin Anglais, its basin 
and outlet being surrounded by the conven- 
tional stone rim or border. After its discovery, 
according to legend, this fountain became the 
rendezvous of the gallants and the poets and 
painters and the "sweet ladies" so often referred 
to in the chronicles of the Renaissance. Rosso, 
the painter, perpetuated one of the most celebrated 
of these reunions in his decorations in the Galerie 
Francois I in the palace, and Cellini represented 
the fair huntress Diana, amid the same sur- 
roundings. 

Under Louis-le-Jeune in 1169 was erected, 
in the Cour du Donjon, the chapel Saint-Saturnin, 
which was consecrated by Saint Thomas ^ Becket, 
then a refugee in France. 

Philippe Auguste and Saint Louis inhabited 
the palace and Philippe-le-Bel died here in 13 14. 
From a letter of Charles VII it appears that 
Isabeau de Baviere had the intention of greatly 
adding to the existing chateau because of the 
extreme healthfulness of the neighbourhood. The 
work was actually begun but seemingly not car- 
ried to any great length. 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 183 

Such was the state of things when Francois I 
came into his own and, because of the supreme 
beauty of the site, became enamoured of it and 
began to erect an edifice which was to outrank 
all others of its class. The king and court made 
of Fontainebleau a second capital. It was a 
model residence of its kind, and gave the first 
great impetus to the Renaissance wave which 
rose so rapidly that it speedily engulfed all France. 

Aside from its palace and its forest, Fontaine- 
bleau early became a noble and a gracious town, 
thanks to the proximity of the royal dwelling. 
In spite of the mighty scenes enacted within its 
walls, the palace has ever posed as one of the 
most placid and tranquil places of royal residence 
in the kingdom. 

All this is true to-day, in spite of the coming 
of tourists in automobiles, and the recent estab- 
lishment of a golf club with the usual appurte- 
nances. Fontainebleau, the town, has a com- 
plexion quite its own. Its garrison and its little 
court of officialdom give it a character which 
even to-day marks it as one of the principal 
places where the stranger may observe the French 
dragoon, with casque and breastplate and boots 
and spurs, at quite his romantic best, though 
it is apparent to all that the cumbersome, if 
picturesque, uniform is an unwieldy fighting 



184 Roy al Palaces and Parks of France 

costume. There was talk long ago of suppress- 
ing the corps, but all Fontainebleau rose up in 
protest. As the popular chanson has it: ^^Lais- 
sez les dragons a leur Maire.'*^ This has become 
the battle cry and so they remain at Fontainebleau 
to-day, the envy of their fellows in the service, 
and the glory of the young misses of the boarding 
schools, who each Saturday are brought out in 
droves to see the sights. 

Many descriptions of Fontainebleau have been 
written, but the works of Poirson, Pfnor and 
ChampoUion-Figeac are generally followed by 
most makers of guidebooks, and, though useful, 
they have perpetuated many errors which were 
known to have been doubtful even before their 
day. 

The best account of Fontainebleau under 
Francois I is given in the manuscript memoir 
of Abbe Guilbert. Apparently an error crept 
into this admirable work, too, for it gives the date 
of the commencement of the constructions of 
Francois as 15 14, whereas that monarch only 
ascended the throne in 151 5. The date of the 
first works under this monarch was 1528, accord- 
ing to a letter of the king himself, which began: 
*'We, the court, intend to live in this palace and 
hunt the ^hetes rousses et noirs qui sont dans 
la joret.^ " 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 185 

An account of Francois I and his "young 
Italian friends" makes mention of the visit of 
the king, in company with the Duchesse d'fetampes, 
to the studio of Serlio who was working des- 
perately on the portico of the Cour Ovale. 
He found the artist producing a '^ melody of 
plastic beauty, garbed as a simple workman, 
his hair matted with pasty clay." He was stand- 
ing on a scaffolding high above the ground when 
the monarch mounted the ladder. Up aloft 
Francois held a conference with his beloved 
workman and, descending, shouted back the 
words: "You understand, Maitre Serlio; let it 
be as you suggest." After the porticos, Serlio 
decorated the Galerie d'Ulysse which has since 
disappeared owing to the indifference of Louis 
XV and the imbecility of his friends; and always 
it was with Francois: "You understand, Maitre 
Serlio; it is as you wish." The motij may have 
been Italian, but the impetus for the work was 
given by the esprit of the French. 

The defeated monarch was not able to bring 
away from Padua any trophies of war; but he 
brought plans of chateaux, and gardens as well. 
He did more: he took the very artists and crafts- 
men who had produced many of the Italian 
masterpieces of the time. 

The tracing of the gardens at Fontainebleau, 



186 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

practically as they exist to-day, was one of Francois 
I's greatest pleasures. In their midst, on the 
shores of the Etang aux Carpes, was erected a 
tiny rest-house where the royal mistresses might 
come to repose and laugh at the jests of Triboulet. 

The edifice of Francois I is of modest propor- 
tions and of perfect unity; but it is with difficulty 
that it presents its best appearance, overpowered 
as it is by the heavier masses of the time of Henri 
IV, and suffering as it does because of the elimina- 
tions of Louis XIV and Louis XV when they 
made their additions to the palace. 

Under the Convention, later on, Fontaine- 
bleau's palace again suffered. Under the Con- 
sulate it became a barracks and a prison, and 
finally, not less terrible, were the restorations 
of Napoleon and Louis Philippe. A castle may 
sometimes suffer less from a siege than from a 
restoration. 

From every point of view, however, Fontaine- 
bleau remains an architectural document of the 
most profound interest and value, and, from 
the tourists' point of view, it is the most appealing 
of all European palaces of this or any other age. 
The expert, the artist and the mere curiosity- 
seeker all unite in their admiration in spite of 
the fact that the fabric has been denuded of many 
of its original beauties. 







^ 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 187 

First, this royal dwelling is of the most ample 
and effective proportions; second, it possesses 
a remarkable series of luxurious apartments; 
third, it still contains some of the finest exam- 
ples of furniture and furnishings of Renaissance 
and Napoleonic times; and, in addition, there is 
also to be seen that admirable series of paintings 
which represent the School of Fontainebleau. 
With such an array of charms what does it matter 
if the unity of the Renaissance masterpiece of 
Francois I is qualified by later interpolations? 
General impression is the standard by which 
one judges the workmanship of a noble monu- 
ment, and here it is good to an extraordinary 
degree. 

The palace of to-day sits at one end of the 
aristocratic little town of Fontainebleau. Be- 
yond is the forest and opposite are many hotels 
which depend upon the palace as the source 
from which they draw their livelihood. 

The principal entrance to the palace opens 
out from the Place Solferino and gives access 
immediately to the Cour du Cheval Blanc of 
Chambiges, which, since that eventful day in 
Napoleonic history nearly a hundred years ago, 
has become better known as the Cour des Adieux. 
At the rear rises the famous horse-shoe stair, 
certainly much better expressed in French as 



188 Eoyal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

the Escalier en Fer a Cheval, from which the 
emperor took his farewell of his '^Vieux Grog- 
nards" lined up before him, biting savagely at 
their moustaches to keep down their emotions. 

This Cour du Cheval Blanc acquired its name 
from a plaster cast of Marcus Aurelius's cele- 
brated steed which was originally placed here 
under a canopy or baldaquin held aloft by colon- 
nettes. The moulds for this work were brought 
from Venice by Primaticcio and Vignole, but 
it was never cast' in bronze and the statue itself 
disappeared in 1626. The courtyard, however, 
still kept the name until the last of Napoleonic 
days. 

As a Napoleonic memory this Cour des Adieux 
shares popularity with the famous Cabinet of 
the Empire suite of apartments where Napoleon 
signed his abdication. Certainly most visitors 
will carry away the memory of these words as 
among the most vivid souvenirs of Fontainebleau. 

" Le 5 Avril, 1814, Napoleon Bonaparte signa 
son abdication sur cette table dans le cabinet 
de travail du Roi, le deuxieme apres la 
chambre a coucher a Fontainebleau,'* 

The abdication itself (the document) is now 
exposed in the Galerie de Diane, transformed 
lately into the Library. 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 189 

On the right is the Aile Neuf, built by Louis XV, 
for the housing of his officers, on the site of the 
Galerie de Ulysse, originally one of the most 
notable features of the palace of Francois I. 
Opposite is the sober alignment of the Aile des 
Ministres, and still farther to the rear are the 
Pavilion des Aumoniers, or de V Horloge ; the 
Chapelle de la Trinite; the Pavilion des Armes; 
the Pavilion des Peintres; the Pavilion des Poels; 
the Galerie des Fresques; and, finally, the Pavil- 
ion des Reines-Meres. All of these details are 
of the period of Francois I save the last, which 
was an interpolation of Louis XIV. 

The Fer a Cheval stairway, however, most 
curious because of the difficulties of its con- 
struction, dates from the time of Louis XIII, 
and replaces the stairs built by Philibert Delorme. 
The tennis court, just before the Pavilion de 
I'Horloge, dates only from Louis XV. 

The imposing entrance court is a hundred 
and twelve metres in width by a hundred and 
fifty-two metres in length, and to see it as it was 
originally, before the destruction of the Galerie 
d'Ulysse, one must imagine it as closed in by a 
series of small pavilions with their frontons of 
colonnettes preceded only by a staircase and 
two drawbridges crossing the moat, which at 
that time surrounded the entire confines of the 



190 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

palace. The moat is to-day surrounded, where 
it still exists, by a balustrade, due to the rather 
shabby taste of Louis XV. 

An inner courtyard, known as the Cour de la 
Fontaine, is incomparably of finer general design 
than the entrance court, and the Cour Ovale, 
absolutely as Henri IV left it, is finer still. At 
the foot of this latter court is the Baptistry where 
were baptised, in 1606, the three "Enfants de 
France," the dauphin, afterwards Louis XIII; 
the Princesse Elizabeth, afterwards the Queen 
of Spain; and the Princesse de Savoie. 

The Cour Ovale is practically of the pro- 
portions of the ancient Manor of Fontaine Belle 
Eau, built by Robert le Pieux. There, too, 
Philippe Auguste, Saint Louis, Philippe-le-Bel, 
Charles V and Charles VII frequently resided. 
Francois I had no wish that this old manor should 
entirely disappear and preserved its old donjon, 
a relic which has since gone the way of many 
another noble fane. There are several other 
notable courts or gardens, the Cour des Offices, 
the Jardin de Diane, the Orangerie, the Cour 
des Princes, etc. 

All the original gardens were laid out anew 
by Louis XIV, and that of Diane underwent a 
considerable change at the hands of Napoleon, 
who also laid out a Jardin Anglais on the site 




Salle du Throne, Fontainebleau 



Fontainebleau and its Forest I9l 

of the ancient Jardin des Pins, where originally 
sprang into being the rippling Fontaine Beleau, 
or Belle Eau, which gave its name to the palace, 
the forest and the town. 

The park, as distinct from the great expanse 
of surrounding forest, is a finely shaded range 
of alleys, due chiefly to Henri IV, who cut the 
great canal of ornamental water and ordained 
the general arrangement of its details. 

The principal curiosity of the park is the 
famous Treille du Roy, or the King's Grape 
Vine, which, good seasons and bad, can be counted 
on to give three thousand kilos of authentic 
chasselaSj grapes of the finest quality. One 
wonders who gets them: Ou s^en vont les raisins 
du roil This is an interrogation that has been 
raised more than once in the French parliament. 

In general, the aspect of the exterior of the 
Palais de Fontainebleau, the walls themselves, 
the Cours, the alleyed walks are chiefly reminis- 
cent of the early art of the Renaissance. Fran- 
5:ois I is, after all, more in evidence than 
the Henris or the Napoleons. Within, the same 
is true in general, though to a less degree. The 
Renaissance is maitresse within and without; 
the other moods are wholly subservient to her 
grace. 

There is hardly an apartment in all the world 



192 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

of palaces in France, or beyond the frontiers, 
to rank with the great Galerie Francois I at 
Fontainebleau, though indeed its proportions 
are modest and its lighting defective to-day, for 
Louis XV blocked up all the windows on one 
side. It remains, however, one of the richest 
examples of the Franco-Italian decoration of 
its era, though somewhat tarnished by the heed- 
lessness of Charles X. 

Never were there before, nor since, its era 
such mythological wall-paintings as are here 
to be seen. The aspirants for the Prix de Rome 
protest each year against such subjects being 
set them for their concours, but their judges, 
recalling how effective such examples are, are 
insistent. The best examples of the School of 
Fontainebleau are a distinct variety of French 
painting. The veriest dabbler in art can say 
with Michelet: ''There is no reminiscence of 
anything Italian therein." 

Frankly, these works were the product of 
secondary artists and their pupils. Leonardo 
da Vinci, too old to do anything more than direct, 
saw himself succeeded by Del Sarto, Rosso and 
Primaticcio. Cellini may have contributed, too, 
but his labours were doubtless blotted out to a 
great extent by the orders of the all-powerful 
Duchesse d'Etampes who feared his competition 




;:::::::::::;;.-xi 

r</:--^. i-f -■:■ 



Cl-PHERor" HENRI n u«<9 23IAME.«?« "POITIERS 




FOJNrT-.A.II>JE.E>L^E.AU 



Pontainebleau and its Forest 193 

with her protege, Primaticcio. One of the masters 
of this coterie was Nicolo delP Abbate, better 
known, perhaps, for his work3 painted at Bologna 
than for his frescoes at Fontainebleau. 

The Galerie Henri II is notable also for its 
decorations, the harmonious juxtaposition of 
sculpture and painting, and, although ^'restored" 
in late years, presents an astonishing pristine 
vigour. This apartment ranks with the Galerie 
Francois I, all things considered, as one of the 
chief show apartments of the palace. Its length 
is thirty metres, its breadth ten, with five ample 
round-headed windows letting in a flood of light 
on either side, one set giving on the Cour Ovale, 
and the other on the Parterre and the magnificent 
facade of the Porte Doree. The ceiling is broken 
up into octagonal caissons^ their depths alter- 
nately laid with gold or silver, bearing the mono- 
gram of the monarch and his devise. The par- 
quet is laid in divisions reproducing the design 
of the ceiling. On either side the walls are 
wainscoted in oak similarly emblazoned in gold 
and silver, with the initials of Diane de Poitiers, 
and of her admirer, Henri, everywhere interlaced. 
Again, a colossal monogram reproduces itself 
in the chimney-piece with the frescoes of Nicolo 
deir Abbate, and fifty figures of mythological 
gods and heroes decorate the window casings. 



194 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The chapel dates chiefly from the time of 
Hem-i IV, the altar and numerous embellish- 
ments belonging to later reigns. 

A certain sentiment, not a little real beauty, 
and much unauthenticated history attach them- 
selves to the Salon Louis XIII, the Salle du 
Trone, the Apartment of Madame de Maintenon, 
those of Napoleon I, of Pope Pius VII and of 
Marie Antoinette. 

The Galerie de Diane is little reminiscent of 
the day of the huntress, being a reconstitution 
under the First Empire, though its decorations 
date from the Restoration, and the ceiling, and fur- 
niture, apparently of the best of Renaissance 
times, are merely copies made by Louis Philippe, 
who did not hesitate, on another occasion, to blue- 
wash the Salon de Saint Louis, and who hung 
worthless third-rate paintings, which even pro- 
vincial museums of the meanest rank have since 
refused to house, in the admirably decorated 
apartments of the period of Francois and Henri. 

Fontainebleau, to-day, is but a memory of 
what it was, a memory by no means fragmentary, 
by no means complete; but all sufficient. 

Of later years there is actually little to single 
out in the way of remarkable additions or restora- 
tions. Under the Second Empire the Galerie 
Francois I was repainted, some false antiquities 




CHE.IVIINE.E1 S>e ^^REIIIME 
'F^ O NT TW I IM EIBL-E: AU 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 195 

added as furnishings, and various ranges of books 
were stored away in the Galerie de Diane, having 
been brought from the chapel which had ceased 
to serve as the Library. This apartment was 
now refitted as a chapel, and, to supplant six 
wall paintings which had been removed. Napoleon 
III ordered seven canvases from the painter 
Schopin, illustrating the life of Saint Saturnin. 

Finally, the Salle de Spectacle completes the 
modern additions, and, while gaudily striking, 
is scarcely above the taste of a gilded cafe in some 
pompous Prefecture. 

Henri IV was the creator of the park of the 
palace, which extended as far as the village of 
Avon and absorbed all the Seigneurie de Mont- 
ceau, of which Mi-Voie (the dairy of Catherine 
de Medici) occupied a part. The acquisition 
of the Seigneurie was made in 1609. Across it 
was cut a ^^ grand canal" in imitation of that 
already possessed by the Chateau de Fleury. 
It was a great rarity as a garden accessory, and 
was more than a quarter of a league long and 
forty metres wide. Bassompierre said in his 
memoirs that Henri IV made him a wager that 
it could be filled with water in two days. It 
actually took eight. 

To the north of the park, Henri IV built, 
under the name of La Menagerie, what he called 



196 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

a maison de plaisance, but which was really the 
forerunner of the animal house at Versailles. 

To all these works of Henri IV in the gardens 
at Fontainebleau is attached the name of Francine. 
There were two brothers of the name, Thomas 
and Alexandre, and it was the latter who chiefly 
occupied himself with the Parterre, the Chaus- 
see and the Grand Canal at Fontainebleau. 
In the Jardin de la Reine he erected the celebrated 
Fontaine de Diane which finally gave its name 
to the garden itself. The fountain was designed 
by Barthelemy Prieur, and was cast in 1603. 
The original bronzes are now in the Louvre, 
those seen at Fontainebleau to-day being later 
works (1684). 

The Forest of Fontainebleau is a dozen leagues 
in circumference, and of an area of nearly thirty- 
five thousand acres. Its beauty, its natural 
beauty, is unrivalled. Rocks, ravines, valleys, 
patriarchal oaks and beeches, plains, woods, 
glades, meadows, lawns and cliffs, all are here. 
Its population of stag and deer was practically 
exterminated during the Revolution of 1830, 
but nevertheless it sustained its reputation as a 
great hunting-ground for long afterwards. 

The Royal Hunt invariably centered at La 
Croix du Grand Veneur, a notable landmark 
of the forest even now^ at the intersection of four 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 197 

magnificent forest roads. Its name comes from 
a legend of a spectral black huntsman who was 
supposed to haunt the forest, and who appeared 
for the last time, in reality or imagination, to 
Henri IV shortly before his assassination. 

In 1854, one of the last and most gorgeous 
of Fontainebleau hunts was given by Louis 
Napoleon. The emperor spent lavishly for the 
equipment of the hunt, and granted liberal stipends 
to the attendants that they might caparison 
themselves with some semblance of picturesque 
dignity; horses and dogs were furnished and 
cared for on the same liberal scale. 

The costuming of a hunting party under such 
conditions was not the least appealing of its 
picturesque elements. Three-cornered hats, gold 
lace, knee breeches, silk stockings and other 
costly properties, when provided for a single 
special occasion, as they were in this case, were 
apt to suggest the life of centuries long gone 
by rather than that of modern times. 

The Forest of Fontainebleau can best be 
briefly described as a rendezvous for tourists and 
"trippers," and as a vast open-air studio for 
the youthful emulators of "the men of Barbison." 

Historic, romantic and artistic memories and 
realities are on every hand; the march of time 
and progress has not dimmed them, nor thinned 



198 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

them out; the Forest of Fontainebleau remains 
to-day the best known and most dehghtful extent 
of wildwood in all the world. 

The chief of the well-known names associated 
with the Forest of Fontainebleau, and one which 
will never die, is that of Denecourt, called also 
the '^Sylvain de la Foret," a mythological appella- 
tion which came from his abounding knowledge 
of its devious ways and byways. It was in 1841 
that Denecourt began his original studies and 
catalogued its every stone and tree. He in- 
vented names and gave a historical setting to 
many a picturesque and romantic site which 
might not have been known at all had it not 
been for his enthusiasm. 

After the vogue of Denecourt all the world 
followed in his footsteps until the Parisian knew 
as well the Longue Rocher, the Gorges d'Apre- 
mont and the Gorge de Franchard as he did 
the Rue de la Paix or the Champs Elysees. Dene- 
court's great work, ^^ Promenades dans la Fork 
de Fontainebleau,''^ appeared in 1845, and if 
he is to be criticised for letting his fancy run 
away with him now and then, and for the opera 
bouff e nomenclature of many of the caves and mares 
and chenes and ''fairy-bowers'* and ''tables of 
kings," he at least has enabled a curious public to 
become better acquainted with this great forest. 



Pontainebleau and its Forest 199 

The flora of the Forest of Fontainebleau is 
remarkably varied ; Denecourt gives seventy varie- 
ties of plants and flowers which grow and prop- 
agate here naturally, to which are to be added 
a great number of nondescript vines, lichens 
and vegetable mosses. 

Of the trees the list extends from the imposing 
and sometimes gigantic oaks, elms, beeches, and 
willows to shrubs and heather growth of the 
most humble species. 

A score or more of the most commonly known 
feathered tribes people the forest to-day with 
almost the same freedom of life and abundance 
as in monarchial times. The songsters are all 
there, from the robin to the nightingale; as well 
as the partridge and the celebrated indigenous 
grouse. 

Previous to 1830 the forest was well supplied 
with big game, deer and wild boar without num- 
ber; but, in later times, as was but natural, these 
have been greatly thinned out. Rabbits and 
hares, to say nothing of foxes and the like, were 
formerly so abundant that, under Louis Philippe, 
it was necessary to carry out what was practically 
a war of extermination. To-day they exist, of 
course, but in no great numbers. 

Another sort of publicity has been given the 
Forest of Fontainebleau by its association with 



200 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

the painters of the thirties. Theodore Rous- 
seau, in 1836, lived at Barbison, which at that 
time was but a hamlet of a few houses, with no 
encumbering hotels, garages and merry-go-rounds 
as to-day. 

A certain Pere Ganne kept a sort of a lodging 
house where artists were made welcome at an 
exceedingly modest price. Not only the really 
famous and much exploited painters of the time 
gained fortunes here, but those of a more con- 
servative school, who never rose to really great 
distinction, also drew much of their inspiration 
from the neighbourhood, among them Hamon, 
Boulanger and Celestin Nanteuil. 

Without having to go far to hunt up their 
subjects, the Forest of Fontainebleau lying near 
Barbison offered to painters much that was not 
available within so small a radius elsewhere. 

Diaz was here already when, in 1849, Jacque 
and Millet arrived upon the scene, and at more 
or less frequent intervals, and for more or less 
lengthy stays, there came Corot, Dupre and 
Daubigny. 

Just what the Barbison school produced in 
the way of painting all the world knows to-day, 
but these men were originally the target of every 
prejudiced critic of the Boulevards and the 
Faubourgs. The present day has brought its 




o 



«K4 



o 
o 

Ho 



Fontainebleau and its Forest 201 

reward and appreciation, though it is the dealers 
who have profited — the men are dead. 

In memory of the fame brought to this httle 
corner of the forest in general, and to Barbison 
in particular, there was placed (in 1894), at the 
entrance to the village, a bronze medallion show- 
ing the heads of Millet and Rousseau. It was 
a delicate way of showing appreciation for the 
talents of those two great men who actually 
founded a new school of painting. 

At the other end of the forest is the little village 
of Marlotte, also a haven for many painters of 
a former day, and no less so for those of to-day. 
The old forest in three quarters of a century 
has seen itself reproduced on canvas in all its 
moods. No painter ever lived, nor could all the 
painters that ever lived, exhaust its infinite variety. 
Hebert in his " Dictionnaire de la Foret de Fon- 
tainebleau" says, rightly enough, that, with 
the coming of the men of Fontainebleau and 
its ^^ artist-villages,'^^ the classic type of "Paysage 
dTtalie" has disappeared from the Salon Cata- 
logues. 

Art amateurs and the common people alike 
made the reputation of Fontainebleau; the mere 
"trippers" were brought thither by Denecourt, 
but the real forest lovers were those who were 
attracted by the masterpieces of the painters. 



202 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The town of Fontainebleau has changed some- 
what under this double influence. At Fontaine- 
bleau itself are two monuments in memory of 
painters who have passed away. One of these 
is to the memory of Decamps, who was killed 
by a fall from his horse while riding in the forest; 
it is a simple bust, the work of Carrier-Belleuse. 
The other is of Rosa Bonheurwho died at Thomery, 
a little village on the southern border of the 
forest, in 1902; it is an almost life-size bull from 
a small model by the artist herself and surmounts 
a pedestal which also bears a medallion of the 
artist. 



CHAPTER XII 

BY THE BANKS OF THE SEINE 

On the highroad to Saint Germain one passes 
innumerable historic monuments which suggest 
the generous part that many minor chateaux 
played in the court life of the capital of old. 

To-day, Maisons, La Muette and Bagatelle are 
mere names which serve the tram lines for roof 
signs and scarcely one in a thousand strangers 
gives them a thought. 

The famous Bois de Boulogne and its immediate 
environment have for centuries formed a delicious 
verdant framing for a species of French country- 
house which could not have existed within the 
fortifications. These luxurious, bijou dwellings, 
some of them, at least, the caprices of kings, 
others the property of the new nobility, and still 
others of mere plebeian kings of finance, are in a 
class quite by themselves. 

Perhaps the most famous of these is the cele- 
brated Bagatelle, within the confines of the Bois 
itself. The Chateau de Bagatelle was built in a 
month, thus meriting its name, by the Comte 

203 



204 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

d'Artois, the future Charles X, as a result of a wager 
with Marie Antoinette. On its facade it originally 
bore the inscription: ^^Parva sed apta^^ — ^^ small 
but convenient." 







liPAsTAz >"" " ' 



Bagatelle occupied a corner of the royal domain 
and, after its completion, was sold to the Marquise 
de Monconseil, in 1747, who gave to this princely 
suburban residence a dignity worthy of its origin. 
Then came La Pompadour on the scene, the petite 
bourgeoise who, by the nobility acquired by the 
donning of a court costume and marriage with 
the Sieur Normand d'Etioles, usurped the right 



By the Banks of the Seine 205 

to sit beside duchesses and be presented to the 
queen, if not as an equal, at least as the maitresse 
of her spouse, the king. 

There is a legend about a meeting between 
La Pompadour and the king at Bagatelle, a meet- 
ing in which she established herself so firmly in 
the graces of the monarch that on the morrow she 
formed a part of the entourage at Versailles. 

After having come into the possession of the 
heirs of Sir Richard Wallace, Bagatelle finally 
became the property of the State. 

It is in the Chateau de Bagatelle that is to be 
installed the ^'Musee de la Parole" — "The 
Museum of Speech." The French, innovators 
ever, plan that Bagatelle shall become a sort of 
conservatory of the human voice, and here will 
be classed methodically the cylinders and disks 
which have recorded the spoken words of all sorts 
and conditions of men. 

In this Musee de la Parole will be kept phono- 
graphic records of all current dialects in France, 
the argot of the Parisian lower classes, etc., etc. 

Up to the present the evolution of the speech 
of man has ever been an enigma. No one knows 
to-day how Homer or Virgil pronounced their 
words, and Racine and Corneille, though of a time 
less remote, have left no tangible record of their 
speech. Monsieur Got of the Comedie Fran- 



206 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

^aise believes that Louis XIV pronounced ^^Moi,^^ 
''le Roi'' as ''Moue'' 'He Roue'') and thus he 
pronounced it in a speech which has been recorded 
in wax and is to form a part of the collection at 
Bagatelle. 

The Polo Grounds of Bagatelle, between the 
chateau and the Seine as it swirls around the He 
de la Folie, are to-day better known than this 
dainty little Paris palace; but Bagatelle will 
some day come to its own again. 

Neuilly bounds the Bois de Boulogne on the 
north, and has little of a royal appearance to-day, 
save its straight, broad streets. 

There is a royal incident connected with the 
Pont de Neuilly which should not be forgotten. 
It came about in connection with the return of 
Henri IV from Saint Germain in company with 
the queen and the Due de Vendome. They were 
in a great coach drawn by four horses which in- 
sisted on drinking from the river in spite of the 
efforts of the coachman to prevent them. 

The carriage was overturned and the royal 
party barely escaped being drowned. One of 
the aids who accompanied them recounted the 
fact that the impromptu bath had cured the 
king's toothache which he had acquired over a 
rather hasty meal just before leaving the palace. 
"Had I witnessed the adventure," said the Mar- 



By the Banks of the Seine 207 

quis de Verneuil, ^^I should have proposed the 
toast: 'Le Roi Boit!' " As a result of this in- 
cident a new bridge was constructed, though it 
was afterwards replaced by the present stone 
structure over which a ceaseless traffic rushes in 
and out of Paris to-day. It was this present 
bridge over which Louis XV was the first to pass 
on September 22, 1772. 

The Chateau de Neuilly was a favourite subur- 
ban residence of Louis Philippe. It was here 
that a delegation came to offer him the crown, and, 
after he had become king, he was pleased to still 
inhabit it and actually spent considerable sums 
upon its maintenance. When the Revolution of 
1848 broke out, the sovereign took refuge at 
Neuilly and, when besieged by the multitude, 
took flight in the night of February 26 and 
left his chateau in the hands of a band of ruffians 
who pillaged it from cellar to garret, finally set- 
ting it on fire. It burned like a pile of brushwood, 
and it is said that more than a hundred drunken 
desperados perished when its walls fell in. This 
was the tragic end of the Chateau de Neuilly. 

By a decree of the president of the later Re- 
public the Orleans princes were obliged to sell all 
their French properties and the park of the 
Chateau de Neuilly was cut up into morsels 
and lots were sold to aU comers. Thus was 



208 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

born that delightful Paris suburb, with the broad, 
shady avenues and comfortable houses, with 
which one is familiar to-day. The aristocratic 
Pare de Neuilly, with Saint James, is the only 
tract near Paris where one finds such lovely 
gardens and such fresh, shady avenues. 

Another quarter of Neuilly possesses a history 
worthy of being recounted. The district known 
as Saint James derived its name from a great 
suburban property which in 1775 belonged to 
Baudart de Saint James. He created a property 
almost royal in its appointments, its gardens hav- 
ing acquired an extraordinary renown. When 
he became a bankrupt a throng of persons visited 
the property not so much with a view to purchase 
as out of curiosity. A writer of the time says 
of this LucuUus that he was the envy of all Paris. 
He died soon after his ruin, from chagrin, and 
in apparent poverty, which seemingly established 
his good faith with his creditors. Under the 
First Empire the domain was bought by, or for, 
the Princesse Borghese, who here gave many bril- 
liant fetes at which the emperor himself frequently 
assisted. On the occasion of the marriage of 
Napoleon to Marie Louise a series of fetes took 
place here which evoked the especially ex- 
pressed encomiums of the emperor. 

In 181 5 Wellington made it his headquarters 



By the Banks of the Seine 209 

and here had his first conference with Blucher. 
Upon WelHngton quitting Saint James the prop- 
erty was pillaged by the Iron Duke's own troops 
and actually demolished by the picks and axes of 
the soldiery. 

Near the Passy entrance of the Bois is La 
Muette, a relic of a royal hunting-lodge which 
took its name from the royal pack of hounds 
(meute) which was formerly kept here. 

The Chateau de la Muette was the caprice of 
Francois I, who, when he came to Paris, wished 
to have his pleasures near at hand, and, being 
the chief partisan of the hunt among French 
monarchs, built La Muette for this purpose. 

The Chateau de la Muette is thus classed as 
one of the royal dwellings of France though 
hardly ever is it mentioned in the annals of to-day. 

Rebuilt by Charles IX, from his father's more 
modest shooting box, La Muette became the 
centre of the court of Marguerite de Navarre, 
the first wife of Henri IV; after which it served 
as the habitation of the dauphin, who became 
Louis XIII. 

During the regency, Philippe d' Orleans took 
possession of the chateau until the enthronement 
of Louis XV. The latter here established a 
little court within a court, best described by the 
French as: ^'ses plaisirs prives.'*^ It was this 



210 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

monarch who rebuilt, or at least restored, the 
chateau, and brought it to the state in which one 
sees it to-day. 

In 1783 Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette and the 
court took up a brief residence here to assist at 
the aerostatic experiences of De Rosier, and in 
1787, ceasing to be a royal residence. La Muette 
was offered for sale after first having been stripped 
of its precious wainscotings, its marbles and the 
artistic curiosities of all sorts with which it had 
been decorated. The chateau itself now became 
the property of Sebastian Erard, who bought it 
for the modest price of two hundred and sixty 
thousand francs. 

Somewhat farther from Paris, crossing the 
peninsula formed by the first of the great bends 
of the Seine below the capital, is Chatou which 
has a royal reminder in its Pavilion Henri IV, 
or Pavilion Gabrielle, which the gallant, love- 
making monarch built for Gabrielle d'Estrees. 
Formerly it was surrounded by a vast park and 
must have been almost ideal, but to-day it is sur- 
rounded by stucco, doll-house villas, and un- 
appealing apartments, until only a Gothic portal, 
jutting from a row of dull house fronts, suggests 
the once cosy little retreat of the lovely Gabrielle. 

The height of Louveciennes, above Bougival, 
closes the neck of the peninsula and from it a vast 



By the Banks of the Seine 211 

panorama of the silvery Seine and its coteaux 
stretches out from the towers of Notre Dame on 
one hand to the dense forest of Saint Germain 
on the other. 

The original Chateau de Louveciennes was the 
property of Madame la Princesse de Conti, but 
popular interest lies entirely with the Pavilion 
du Barry, built by the architect Ledoux under the 
orders of Louis XV. 

Du Barry, having received the chateau as a gift 
from the king, sought to decorate it and reembel- 
lish it anew. Through the ministrations of a 
certain Drouais, Fragonard was commissioned 
to decorate a special pavilion outside the cha- 
teau proper, destined for the ^^ collations du Roi.^^ 

The subject chosen was the ^' Progres de P Amour 
dans le Cceur des Jeunes Filles." Just where 
these panels are to-day no one seems to know, 
but sooner or later they will doubtless be dis- 
covered. 

Fragonard's famous "Escalade," or "Ren- 
dezvous," the first of the series of five proposed 
panels, depicted the passion of Louis XV for du 
Barry. The shepherdess had the form and fea- 
tures of that none too scrupulous feminine beauty, 
and the ^^berger gallanV^ was manifestly a portrait 
of the king. 

Perhaps these decorations at Louveciennes were 



212 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

elaborations of these smaller canvases. It seems 
quite probable. 

Sheltered snugly against the banked-up Forest 
of Saint Germain, on the banks of the Seine, 
is Maisons-Laffitte. Maisons is scarcely ever 
mentioned by Parisians save as they comment 
on the sporting columns of the newspapers, for 
horse-racing now gives its distinction to the 
neighbourhood, and the old Chateau de Maisons 
(with its later suffix of Laffitte) is all but for- 
gotten. 

Francois Mansart built the first Chateau de 
Maisons on a magnificent scale for Rene de Long- 
ueil, the Superintendent of Finance. In a later 
century it made a most effectual appeal to another 
financier, Laffitte, the banker, who parcelled out 
the park and stripped the chateau. 

For a century, though, the chateau belonged to 
the family of its founder, and in 1658 the sur- 
rounding lands were made into a Marquisate. 
In 1 67 1, on the day of the death of Philippe, Due 
d'Anjou, Maisons may be said to have become 
royal for the court there took up its residence. 
Later, the Marquis de Soyecourt became the 
owner and Voltaire stayed here for a time; in fact 
he nearly died here from an attack of smallpox. 

In 1778 the property was acquired by the 
Comte d'Artois and the royal family of the 



By the Banks of the Seine 213 

time were frequent guests. The king, the queen 
and each of the princes all had their special 
apartments, and if Louis XVI had not been too 
busy with other projects, more ambitious ones, 
there is little doubt but that he would have given 
Maisons an eclat which during all of its career 
it had just missed. At the Revolution it was sold 
as National Property and the proceeds turned 
into public coffers. 

With the Empire the chateau became more 
royalist than ever. Marechal Lannes became 
its proprietor, then the Marechal de Montebello, 
who here received Napoleon on many occasions. 
With the invasion of 1815 the village was devas- 
tated, but the chateau escaped, owing to its having 
been made the headquarters of the invading 
allies. After this, in 181 8, the banker Laffitte 
came into possession. He exercised a great hos- 
pitality and lived the life of an opulent bourgeois, 
but he destroyed most of the outbuildings and 
the stables built by Mansart, and cut up the great 
expanse of park which originally consisted of five 
hundred hectares. His ideas were purely com- 
mercial, not the least esthetic. 

The scheme of decoration within, as without, is 
distinctly unique. Doric pilasters and columns 
support massive cornices and round-cornered 
ceilings, with here and there antique motives and 



214 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

even Napoleonic eagles as decorative features. 
To-day all the apartments are deserted and sad. 
The finest, from all points of view, is that of the 
Salle-a- Manger, though indeed some of the motives 
are but plaster reproductions of the originals. 
The chimney-piece, however, is left, a pure bijou, 
a model of grace, more like a pagan altar than a 
comparatively modern mantel. The oratory is 
in the pure style of the Empire, and the stairway, 
lighted up by a curiously arranged dome-lantern, 
gives a most startling effect to the entrance ves- 
tibule. 

In general the design of Maisons is gracious, 
not at all outre, though undeniably grandiose ; too 
much so for a structure covering so small an area. 
The Cour d'Honneur gives it its chief exterior 
distinction and the two pavilions have a certain 
grace of charm, when considered separately, which 
the ensemble somewhat lacks. The surroundings, 
had they not been ruthlessly cut up into building 
lots for over-ambitious Paris shopkeepers, would 
have added greatly to the present appearance 
of the property. As it is, the near-by race-course 
absorbed the orchard, the pelouse and many of 
the garden plots. 



CHAPTER XIII 

MALMAISON AND MARLY 

Out from Paris, by the cobbly Pave du Roi, 
which a parental administration is only just now 
digging up and burying under, just beyond the 
little suburban townlet of Rueil (where the Em- 
press Josephine and her daughter Hortense lie 
buried in the parish church), one comes to Mal- 
maison of unhappy memory. It is not imposing, 
palatial, nor, architecturally, very worthy, but it 
is one of the most sentimentally historic of all 
French monuments of its class. 

Since no very definite outlines remain of any 
royal historical monument at Rueil to-day the 
tourist bound towards Versailles by train, tram or 
road, gives little thought to the snug little suburb 
through which he shuffles along, hoping every 
minute to leave the noise, bustle and cobble- 
stones of Paris behind. 

Rueil is deserving of more consideration than 
this. According to Gregory of Tours the first race 
of kings had a "pleasure house" here, and called 
the neighbourhood Rotolajum. Not always did 

215 



216 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

these old kings stay cooped up in a fortress in the 
Isle of Lutetia. Sometimes they went afield for 
a day in the country like the rest of us, and to 
them, with their slow means of communication 
and the bad roads of their day, Rueil, scarce a 
dozen miles from Notre Dame, seemed far away. 

Childerbert I, son of Clovis, is mentioned as 
having made a protracted sojourn at Rueil, and 
whatever may have existed then in the way of a 
royal residence soon after passed to the monks 
of Saint Denis, who here fished and hunted and 
lived a life of comfort and ease such as they could 
hardly do in their fortress-abbey. They, too, 
required change and rest from time to time, and, 
apparently, when they could, took it. 

The Black Prince burned the town and all its 
dependencies in 1346, and only an unimportant 
village existed when Richelieu thought to build a 
country-house here on this same charming site 
which had so pleased the first French monarchs. 
Richelieu did his work well, as always, and built an 
immense chateau, surrounded by a deep moat 
into which were turned the swift-flowing waters 
of the Seine. A vast park was laid out, in part 
in the formal manner and in part as a natural 
preserve, and the neighbourhood once more 
became frequented by royalty and the nobles 
of the court. 



Malmaison and Marly 217 

Richelieu bequeathed the property to his niece, 
the Duchesse d'Aiguillon, and Louis XIV became 
a frequent dweller there — as a visitor, but he 
did not mind that. Louis XIV was sometimes a 
monarch, sometimes a master, and sometimes a 
"family friend," to put it in a noncommittal 
manner. 

The Revolution nearly made way with the prop- 
erty and the Due de Massena, a few years after- 
wards, reestablished it after a fashion, but spec- 
ulating land-boomers came along in turn and 
royal memories meaning nothing to them the 
property was cut up into streets, avenues and 
house lots. 

The Chateau de Malmaison, which is very near 
Rueil, is in quite a different class. Its history 
comes very nearly down to modern times. The 
memory of Malmaison is purely Napoleonic. Its 
historical souvenirs are many, but its actual ruins 
have taken on a plebeian aspect of little appeal in 
these later days. 

In 1792 Malmaison was sold as a piece of na- 
tional merchandise to be turned into ecus, and a 
certain Monsieur Lecouteux de Canteleu, hav- 
ing the ready cash and a disposition to live under 
its roof, took over the proprietorship for a time. 
It was he who sold it to Josephine Beauharnais, 
and it was she who gave it a glory and splendour 



218 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

which it had never before possessed, gave it its 
complete fame, in fact. 

Napoleon himself, as First Consul, was pas- 
sionately fond of the place, but by the time he 
had become emperor, because of unhappy memo- 
ries, perhaps, for he had them at times, came 
rarely to this charming suburban chateau. 

It was at Malmaison that began the good for- 
tune of Josephine, and it was at Malmaison that 
it flickered out like the dying flame of a candle. 

In a beating rain, on Saturday, December i6, 
1809, Josephine quitted the Tuileries, her eyes 
still red with the tears from that last brief inter- 
view. She arrived at Malmaison at the end of 
a lugubrious day, when the whole place was en- 
veloped in a thick fog. She passed the night 
almost alone in this great house where she had 
previously been so happy. She could hardly, 
however, have been more sad than Napoleon was 
that same night. He had shut himself up in his 
cabinet, remorseful and alone. 

The Sunday following was hardly less melan- 
choly, for it was then Josephine learned that Mal- 
maison had been endowed with an income of 
two millions for its upkeep, and that her per- 
sonal belongings and the furnishings of her fa- 
vourite apartments were already on the way thither 
from the Tuileries. The wound was not even 




■?*::':':^fv:^::^?^?i^*;^'^v:-^v-:rVS^ >^j.i>!^l-^Wgtf 



1 - ,■;■.', 

Cfmteau tk Malmauon 





2iS Eoyal Palaces and Parks of France 



which it had never before jx^ssessed, gave it its 
complete fame, in fact. 

Napoleon himself, as First Consul, was pas- 
sionately fond of the place, but by the time he 
had become emperor, because of unhappy memo- 
ries, perhaps, for he had them at times, came 
rarely to this charming suburban chateau. 

It was at Malmaison that began the good for- 
tune of Josephine, and it was at Malmaison that 
it flickered out like the dying flame of a candle. 

In a beating rain, on Saturday, December i6, 
1809, Josephine quitted the Tuiieries, her eyes 
still red with the tears from that last brief inter- 
view. She arrived at Malmaison at the end of 

a lugubrious ^ v^ ^^^^MfCP^'^''^^'^^^^''' 
veloped in a thick fog. She passed the night 
almost alone in this great house where she had 
previously been so happy. She could hardly, 
however, have httn more sad than Napoleon was 
that same night. He had shut himself up in his 
cabinet, remorseful and alone. 

The Sunday following was hardly less melan- 
choly, for it was then Josephine learned that Mal- 
maison had been endowed with an income of 
two milhons for its upkeep, and that lier per- 
sonal belongings and the furnishings of her fa- 
vourite apartments were already on ihc wa^^ thither 
from the Tuiieries, The wound was riot even 



Malmaison and Marly 219 

then allowed to heal, for she learned that Napo- 
leon had ordained that she was to receive the visits 
of the court as if she were still empress. 

Napoleon had already written his former spouse 
to the effect that he would give much to see her, 
but that he did not feel sufficiently sure of him- 
self to permit of it. This historic letter closed 
thus; ^' Adieu J Josephine, bonne nuit, si tu doutais 
de moij tout sera hien indigne.^^ 

On the 17th of December Napoleon actually 
did come to Malmaison to see her from whom 
he was officially separated. Josephine had con- 
fided to Madame de Remusat, her lady-in-waiting, 
"It almost seems as if I were dead, and only 
possessed of the faculty of remembering the 
past." 

In this Malmaison, so full of souvenirs of other 
days, Josephine was obliged to content herself, 
for on January 12, 1810, the religious marriage 
of Josephine and Napoleon was annulled auto- 
matically because, as was claimed, it had not 
been celebrated with the necessary formalities. 

Here at Malmaison Josephine even surrounded 
herself with the most intimate souvenirs of Na- 
poleon: a lounging chair that he was wont to 
occupy stood in its accustomed place; his bed 
was always made; his sword hung upon the wall; 
his pen was in his inkwell; a book was open on 



220 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

his desk and his geographical globe — his famous 
mappemond — was in its accustomed place. 

Princes passing through Paris came to Mal- 
maison to salute the former empress, and she 
allowed herself to become absorbed in her green- 
houses and her dairy, the direction of her house, 
her receptions and her petite cour. 

In time all came to an end. When Napoleon 
returned to Paris in 1815 he interrogated the 
doctor who had cared for Josephine during the 
illness which terminated in her death the year 
before and asked him: "Did she speak of me at 
the last?'' The doctor replied: "Often, very 
often." With emotion Napoleon replied simply: 
^^ Bonne femme: bonne Josephine elle m^aimeit 
vraiment.^^ 

After Waterloo Napoleon himself retired to 
Malmaison, which had become the property of 
Josephine's children, Eugene and Hortense, and 
closed himself up in the room where she died, 
the library which he occupied when triumphant 
First Consul. 

Here he lived five mortal days of anguish pre- 
ceding his departure for Rochefort on that 
agonizing exile from which he never returned. 

After the divorce Josephine preserved the 
property as her own particular residence, and in 
1814 received there the celebrated visit of the 



Malmaison and Marly 221 

allied sovereigns. History tells of a certain boat 
ride which she took on a neighbouring lake in 
company with the Emperor Alexander which is 
fraught with much historic sentiment. It was 
this imprudent excursion, in the cool of a May 
evening, that caused the death of the former 
empress three days later. It was from this bijou 
of a once royal abode that Napoleon launched 
his famous proclamation to the army which the 
arrogant Fouche refused to have printed in 
the ^' Moniteur Officieiy Upon this Napoleon 
sent the Due de Rovigo to Paris for his pass- 
ports and the necessary orders which would en- 
able him to depart in peace. The next moment 
he had changed his mind, and he changed it again 
a few moments afterwards. As the result of the 
Prussians' advance on Paris by the left bank of 
the Seine Napoleon was obliged to accept the 
inevitable, and with the words of General Becker 
ringing in his ears: ^^ Sire, tout est pret,^'' he crossed 
the vestibule and entered the gardens amid a 
painful calm on his part, and an audible weeping 
by his former fellows in arms who were lined 
up to do him honour. He embraced Hortense 
passionately, and saluted all the personages of 
his party with a sympathy and emotion unbeliev- 
able. With an eternal adieu and a rapid step 
down the garden walk to the driveway, he at last 



222 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

entered the carriage which was awaiting him and 
was driven rapidly away. Some days after the 
AlHes pillaged and sacked Malmaison. Its chief 
glory may be said to have departed with the 
Corsican. 

Under the Restoration, Prince Eugene had a 
sort of "rag sale" of what was left. The lands 
which Josephine had bought of Lecouteaux 
were sold to the highest bidder and the exotic 
shrubs and plants to any who would buy, the pic- 
tures to such connoisseurs as had the price, those 
that were left being sent to Munich. A Swedish 
banker now came on the scene (1826) and bought 
the property — the chateau and the park — which 
he preserved until his death twenty years later. 
Then it went to Queen Christina, and was ulti- 
mately purchased by Napoleon III. 

In October, 1870, during the siege of Paris, 
General Ducrot sought to make a reconnoissance 
by way of Malmaison, and so weak was his pro- 
ject that the equipages of the King of Prussia 
and his Etat Major invested the environs and 
made the property their official headquarters. 

Near by is a fine property called "Les Bruy- 
eres," a royal estate of Napoleon III. It was 
created and developed by the emperor and was 
always referred to as a Pare Imperial. 

Perhaps the most banal of all the royal souvenirs 



Malmaison and Marly 223 

around Paris is that gigantic mill-wheel known as the 
Machine de Marly, down by the Seine a few miles 
beyond Malmaison, just where that awful cobble- 
stoned roadway begins to climb up to the plateau on 
which sits the chateau of Saint Germain and its park. 

Because it is of unesthetic aspect is no reason 
for ignoring the famous Machine de Marly, the 
great water-hoisting apparatus first established 
in the reign of Louis XIV to carry the waters of 
the Seine to the ponds and fountains of Versailles. 

It was a creation of a Liegois, named Renne- 
quin Sualem, who knew not how to read or write, 
but who had a very clear idea of what was wanted 
to perform the work which Louis XIV demanded. 
For a fact the expense of the erection of the 
*^ Machine," and the cost of keeping its great 
wheels turning, were so great that it is doubtful 
if it was ever a paying proposition, but that was 
not a sine qua non so far as the king's command 
was concerned. It had cost millions of livres 
before its wheels first turned in 1682, and, if the 
carpenter Brunet had not come to the rescue to 
considerably augment the volume of water raised 
(by means of compressed air), it is doubtful if there 
would ever have been enough water for the foun- 
tains of Versailles to play even one day a year, as 
they do now every happy Sunday, to the delight of 
the middle-class Parisian and the droves of Cook- 



224 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

ites who gaze on them with wonder-opened eyes. 

The water was led from the Machine de Marly 
to Versailles by a conduit of thirty-six arches 
where, upon reaching a higher level than the gar- 
dens, it flowed by gravity to the fountains and 
basins below. This aqueduct was six hundred 
and forty-three metres long, and twenty-three 
metres high. It was a work which would have 
done credit to the Romans. 

A far greater romantic sentiment attaches itself 
to the royal chateau of Marly-le-Roi than to the 
utilitarian ^^ Machine, " by which the suburb is 
best known to-day. 

The history of Marly-le-Roi appears from the 
chronicles the most complicated to unravel of 
that of any of the kingly suburbs of old Paris, 
though in the days of the old locomotion a town- 
let twenty-six kilometres from the capital was 
hardly to be thought of as a suburb. 

Marly-le-Roi, at any rate, with Marly-le-Bourg 
and Marly-le-Chatel, was a royal dwelling from 
the days of Thierry III (678). The neighbour- 
ing region had been made into a countship by 
the early seventeenth century, and Louis XIV 
acquired it as his right in exchange for Neuphle- 
le-Chateau in 1693, incorporating it into the 
domain of Versailles. 

By this time it had become known as Marly- 



Malmaison and Marly 225 

le-Roi, in distinction to the other bourgs, and 
the king built a chateau-royal, variously known 
as the Palais and the Ermitage. For a fact it 
was neither one thing nor the other, according to 
accepted definition, but rather a group of a dozen 
dependent pavilions distributed around a central 
edifice, the whole straggling off into infinite and 
manifestly unlovely proportions. It was as the 
sun surrounded by the zodiac. 

Isolated on a monticule by the river bank the 
chateau overlooked its brood of small pavilions, 
which in a way formed an entresol^ or foyer, lead- 
ing to the Pavilion Royal. All were connected 
by iron trellises, en berceau, and the effect must 
have been exceedingly bizarre; certainly theatrical. 

The four faces of these pavilions were frescoed, 
and balustrades and vases at the corners were 
the chief architectural decorations. 

The royal pavilion consisted within of four 
vestibules on the ground floor, each leading to 
a grand apartment in the centre. In each of the 
four angles was a "self-contained" apartment 
of three or four rooms. What this royal abode 
lacked in beauty it made up for in convenience. 

Each of the satellite pavilions was occupied by 
a high personage at court. The Chapel and the 
Corps de Garde were detached from the chateau 
proper, and occupied two flanking wings. 



226 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The plans of the "Palais-Chateau-Ermitage'* 
of Marly-le-Roi were from the fertile brain of 
Mansart, and were arranged with considerable 
ingenuity, if not taste, generously interspersed 
with lindens and truly magnificent garden plots. 
There was even a cascade, or rather a tumbling 
river (according to the French expression), for 
it fell softly over sixty-three marble steps, forming 
a sort of wrinkled sheet of water, which must 
indeed have been a very charming feature. It 
cost a hundred thousand ecus to merely lead the 
water up to it. The expenses of the Pavilion 
de Marly, in the ten years from 1680 to 1690, 
amounted to 4501279 livres, 12 sols, 3 denier s. 
From this one may well judge that it was no 
mean thing. 

The. honour of being accounted a person of 
Marly in those times was accredited as a great 
distinction, for it went without saying in that case 
one had something to do with affairs of court, 
though one might only have been a "furnisher.'^ 
To be a courtier of Louis XIV, or to be a pen- 
sionnaire at Versailles, could hardly have carried 
more distinction. 

The court usually resided at Marly from Wed- 
nesday until Saturday, and as "the game" was 
the thing it is obvious that the stakes were high. 

The vogue of the day was gaming at table, and 



Malmaison and Marly 227 

Marly, of all other suburban Paris palaces, was 
an ideal and discreet place for it. "High play 
and midnight suppers were the rule at Marly." 
This, one reads in the court chronicle, and further 
that: "The royal family usually lost a hundred 
thousand ecus at play at each visit . " One " gentle- 
man croupier" gained as much as three thousand 
louis at a single sitting. 

Madame de Maintenon was the real ruler of 
Marly in those days; she had appropriated the 
apartments originally intended for the queen, 
from which there was a private means of com- 
munication to the apartments of the king, and 
another forming a sort of private box, overlook- 
ing the royal chapel. 

Little frequented by Louis XV, and practically 
abandoned by Louis XVI, the palace at Marly 
was sold during the Revolution, after which it 
was stripped of its art treasures, many of which 
adorn the gardens of the Tuileries to-day; the 
great group of horses at the entrance to the Champs 
Elysees came from the watering place of Marly. 

Actually, the royal pavilion at Marly has been 
destroyed, and there remain but the most frag- 
mentary, unformed heaps of stones to tell the tale 
of its ample proportions in the days of Louis 
XIV and de Maintenon. 

The park is to-day the chief attraction of the 



228 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

neighbourhood, like the one at Saint Cloud, 
which it greatly resembles. Across the park lies 
the great highway from the capital to Versailles, 
over which so many joyous cavalcades were wont 
to amble or gallop in the days of gallantry. The 
pace is not more sober to-day, but gaily caparisoned 
horses and gaudy coaches have given way to red 
and yellow '^Rois des Beiges," the balance lying 
distinctly in favour of the former mode of convey- 
ance, so far as picturesqueness is concerned. 

The Foret de Marly is very picturesque, but of 
no great extent. Formerly it enclosed many 
shooting-boxes belonging to the nobles of the 
court, of which those of Montjoie and Desert de 
Retz were perhaps the most splendid. 

On the Versailles road was the Chateau de 
Clagny, a royal maison de plaisance, of an attrac- 
tive, but trivial, aspect, though its architecture 
was actually of a certain massiveness. Its gar- 
dens and the disposition of its apartments pleased 
the king's fancy when he chose to pass this way, 
which was often. He is said to have personally 
spent over two million francs on the property. 
It must have been of some pretensions, this little 
heard of Chateau de Clagny, for in a single year 
ten thousand livres were expended on keeping 
the gardens. To-day it is non-existent. 



CHAPTER XIV 

SAINT CLOUD AND ITS PARK 

The historic souvenirs of Saint Cloud and its 
royal palace are many and varied, though scarcely 
anything tangible remains to-day of the fabric 
so loved by Francis I and Henri II, and which 
was, for a fact, but a magnificent country-house, 
originally belonging to the Archbishops of Paris. 

To-day the rapid slopes of the hillsides of 
Saint Cloud are peopled with a heterogeneous 
mass of villas of what the Parisian calls the 
''coquette" order, but which breathe little of 
the spirit of romance and gallantry of Renais- 
sance times. Saint Cloud is simply a "discreet'' 
Paris suburb, and the least said about it, its 
villas and their occupants to-day, the better. 

The little village of Saint Cloud which is half- 
hidden in the Forest of Rouvray, was sacked 
and burned by the English after the battle of 
Poitiers, and then built up anew and occupied 
by the French monarchs in the reign of Charles 
VI. It was he who built the first chateau de 
plaisance here in which the royal family might live 

229 



230 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

near Paris and yet amid a sylvan environment. 

After this came the country-house of the Arch- 
bishops of Paris that Henri II, when he tired 
of it, tore down and erected a villa in the pseudo- 
Italian manner of the day, and built a four- 
teen-arch stone bridge across the Seine, which 
was a wonder of its time. 

The banker Gondi, after huddling close to 
royalty, turned over an establishment which 
he had built to Catherine de Medici, who made 
use of it whenever she wished to give a country 
fete or garden party. By this time the whole 
aspect of Saint Cloud was royal. 

It was within this house that the unhappy, 
and equally unpopular, Henri III was cut down 
by the three-bladed knife of the monk Jacques 
Clement. The incident is worth recounting 
briefly here because of the rapidity with which 
history was made by a mere fanatical knife- 
thrust. With the death of Henri III came the 
extinction of the House of Valois. 

As the king sat in the long gallery of the palace 
playing at cards, on August i, 1589, his cloak 
hanging over his shoulder, a little cap with a 
flower stuck in it perched over one ear, and 
suspended from his neck by a broad blue ribbon 
a basketful of puppies, an astrologer by the name of 
Osman was introduced to amuse the royal party. 



St. Cloud and Its Park 231 

"They tell me you draw horoscopes," re- 
marked the king. 

"Sire, I will tell yours, if you will, but the 
heavens are unpropitious. " 

*^U ^U ^f %^ >ltf %S^ ml0 

1* *y» fj* *J» r^ ^^ ^^ 

"Just over Meudon is a star which shines 
very brightly," continued the astrologer, "it 
is that of Henri de Navarre. But look, your 
Majesty, another star burns brilliantly for a 
moment and then disappears, mayhap it is your 
own." 

"If ever a man had a voice hoarse with blood 
it is that astrologer," said the king. "Away 
with him." 

"If the Valois Henri doesn't die before the 
setting of another sun, I'll never cast horoscope 
more," said the astrologer as he was hustled 
across the courtyard and out into the highroad. 

As he left, a man in a monk's garb begged to 
be admitted to the king's presence. It was 
Jacques Clement, the murderous monk, a wily 
Dominican, bent on a mission which had for 
its object the extinction of the Valois race. 

While the king was reading a letter which 
the monk had presented the latter stabbed him 
deep in the stomach. 

Swooning, the king had just time to cry out: 
*^Ha! le mechant moine: II m^a tue, qu^on le tue.^^ 



232 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The murderer in turn was struck down forth- 
with and his body, thrown from the windows 
of the palace, was ecartele by four white horses, 
which is the neat French way of saying '^ drawn 
and quartered." 

It was an imposing cortege which wound down 
from the heights of Saint Cloud and followed 
the river bank to Saint Germain, Poissy and 
thence to Compiegne, conveying all that was 
mortal of Henri III, the least popular of all the 
race of Valois. Following close behind the 
bier were Henri IV and his suite, the favourites 
d'Epernon, Laschant, Dugastz and an impres- 
sive soldiery. 

After the death of Henri III, Henri de Navarre, 
who played a not unpicturesque part in the 
funeral ceremonies, installed himself in a neigh- 
bouring property known as the Maison du Til- 
let. Thus it is seen that the royal stamp 
of the little bourg of Saint Cloud was never 
wanting — not until the later palace and most 
of the town were drenched with kerosene and set 
on fire by the Prussians in 1871. 

The "Maison de Gondi" came, by a process 
of acquisition, and development, in time, to be 
the royal palace of Saint Cloud. Its overloaded 
details of Italian architecture were brightened 
up a bit by the surroundings planned and exe- 



St. Cloud and its Park 233 



cuted by the landscapist Le Notre and the Hfe 
of the court in its suburban retreat took on a 
real and genuine brilliance which under the 
restraint of the gloomy walls of the Louvre and 
Paris streets could hardly have been. 

The brightest light shining over Saint Cloud 
at this time was the radiance shed by the brilliant 
Henriette d'Angleterre. Her reign as a social 
and witty queen of the court was brief. She 
died at the age of twenty-six, poisoned at the 
instigation of the Chevalier de Lorraine whom 
she had caused to be exiled. This was the com- 
mon supposition, but Louis XIV was afterwards 
able to prove (?) his brother innocent of the 
crime. 

The gazettes of the seventeenth century re-- 
count many of the fetes given at Saint Cloud 
by Monsieur on the occasion of his marriage 
to the Princesse Palatine in 1671. One of the 
most notable of these was that given for Louis XIV, 
wherein the celebrated cascades — an innova- 
tion of Le Notre — were first brought to view. 

Mansart was called in and a great gallery 
intended for fetes and ceremonies was con- 
structed, and Mignard was given the commis- 
sion for its decorations. 

Monsieur died within the walls of the palace 
to which he had added so many embellishments, 



234 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

as also did his second wife. Three royalties 
dead of ambition, one might well say, for their 
lives were neither tranquil nor healthful. They 
went the pace. 

The regent journeyed out from Paris to this 
riverside retreat to receive the Tzar Peter in 
1 71 7, and in 1752 Louis Philippe d'Orleans 
set about to give a fete which should obscure 
the memory of all former events of a like nature 
into oblivion. How well he succeeded may be 
a matter of varying opinion, for the French have 
ever been prodigally lavish in the conduct of such 
affairs. At all events the occasion was a notable 
one. 

The predilection of royalty for Saint Cloud 
was perhaps not remarkable, all things con- 
sidered, for it was, and is, delightfully environed, 
and about this time the Due d' Orleans secretly 
married the Marquise de Montesson and installed 
her in a habitation the ^^ plus simple ^^^ a mere 
shack, one fancies, costing six millions. The 
nouveau riche of to-day could scarcely do the 
thing with more eclat. 

The Revolution took over the park of Saint 
Cloud and its appurtenances and donated them 
to the democracy — "for the pleasure of the 
people, " read the decree. 

On the eighteenth Brumaire, the First Re- 



St. Cloud and Its Park 235 

public blinked itself out in the Palais de Saint 
Cloud, and the Conseil de Cinq Cents installed 
itself therein under the Directoire. Bonaparte, 
returning from Egypt, arrived at Saint Cloud 
just as Lemercier was dissolving the Conseil. 
Seeing trouble ahead he commanded Murat to 
clear the chamber by drawn bayonets. He 
kept his light shining just a bit ahead of the 
others, did Napoleon. His watchword was in- 
itiative. Deputies clambered over each other 
in their haste to escape by stairway, door and 
window, and Bonaparte saw himself Consul 
without opposition — for ten years — for life. 

The royal residences were put at Napoleon's 
disposition and he wisely chose Saint Cloud 
for summer; Saint Cloud the cradle of his powers. 
As a restorer and rebuilder of crumbling monu- 
ments Napoleon was a master, as he was in the 
destructive sense when he was in the mood, 
and changes and additions were made at Saint 
Cloud which for comfort and convenience put it 
in the very front rank of French royal residences. 

In March, 1805, Pope Pius VII baptised, 
amid a grand pomp and ceremony, in the chapel 
of the palace, the son of Louis Bonaparte, and 
five years afterwards (April i, 18 10), the same 
edifice saw the religious marriage of Napoleon 
with Marie Louise. 



236 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

On March 31, 18 10, a strange animation 
dominated all the confines of the palace. It 
was the occasion of the celebration of Napoleon's 
civil marriage with Marie Louise. They did 
not enter the capital until three days later for 
the ceremonial which united the daughter of 
the emperors who were descendants of the Roman 
Caesars, to the ' 'Usurper," who was now for the 
first time to rank with the other crowned heads 
of Europe. 

The cortege which accompanied their majes- 
ties from Saint Cloud to Paris was a pageant 
which would take pages to describe. The reader 
of these lines is referred to the impassioned pages 
of the works of Frederic Masson for ample details. 

A hundred thousand curiosity seekers had 
come out from Paris and filled the alleys of the 
park to overflowing. Music and dancing were 
on every hand. Mingled with the crowd were 
soldiers of all ranks brilliantly clad in red, blue 
and gold. "These warriors were a picturesque, 
obtrusive lot," said a chronicler; "after having 
invaded Austria they acclaim the Austrian." 

In 181 5 the capitulation of Paris was signed 
at Saint Cloud. The gardens were invaded 
by a throng which gave them more the aspect 
of an intrenched camp than a playground of 
princes. A brutal victor had climbed booted 



St. Cloud and Its Park 237 

and spurred into the bed of the great Napoleon 
and on arising pulled the bee-embroidered dra- 
peries down with him and trampled them under 
foot. Was this a proper manifestation of victory ? 

At this period another great fete was given 
in the leafy park of Saint Cloud, a fete which 
French historians have chiefly passed over silently. 
The host on this occasion was the Prince of 
Schwartzenburg; the principal guests the foreign 
sovereigns, gloating over the downfall of the 
capital. 

Louis XVIII, after removing the traces of 
this desolate invasion, took up his residence 
here on June i8, 1817, and in the following 
year built the stables and the lodgings of the 
Gardes du Corps. In 1820 the chapel begun 
by Marie Antoinette was finished and the Jardin 
du Trocadero constructed. 

Charles X in his brief reign built, on the site 
of an old Ursulin convent, further quarters in- 
tended for the personnel of the court. The en- 
semble ever took on an increasing importance. 
At this time were laid out the gardens between 
the cascades and the river, which, to some slight 
extent, to-day, suggest the former ample magnif- 
icence of the park as it faced upon the river. 
Leading through this lower garden was the 
Avenue Roy ale extending to the chateau. 



238 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Saint Cloud for Charles X, in spite of his first 
interest therein, could have been but an un- 
happy memory for here he signed the abdication 
which brought about his fall. He left his palace 
at Saint Cloud on July 30, 1830, at three o'clock 
in the morning, just as day was breaking through 
the mists of the valley. He succumbed, the 
last of the Bourbons, on the same spot on which 
Henri IV, as chief of the house, had first been 
saluted as king. 

Louis Philippe divided his time between Neuilly 
and Saint Cloud, and lent his purse and his en- 
thusiasm to elaborating to a very consider- 
able extent both the palace and its surroundings. 

Napoleon III made Saint Cloud his preferred 
summer residence, and was actually beneath 
the palace roof when the Prussian horde com- 
menced its march on the capital of Clovis. He 
left Saint Cloud on July 27, to take personal 
command of the Army of the Rhine at Metz. 

As did Charles X, Napoleon III ceased to be 
sovereign of the French by enacting the final 
scene in his royal career in the Palais de Saint 
Cloud. Never again was the palace to give 
shelter to a French monarch. The empress 
left precipitately after the disaster of Woerth, 
and two months after the torch of arson made a 
ruin of all the splendour of the palace and its 



St. Cloud and Its Park 239 

dependencies. The inhabitants of the little city, 
which had grown up around the confines of the 
palace, fled in refuge to Versailles during the 
armistice. Scarcely an old house was preserved 
in all the town. 

Among the chefs d'oeuvres of art which perished 
in the flames were the fine works of Mignard 

— above all, the magnificent Galerie d'Apollon 

— the paintings of LeMoyne, Nacret, Leloir, 
the marines of Joseph Vernet and innumerable 
objects of art which had been gathered together 
for the embellishment of Saint Cloud by the 
later monarchs. Some few treasures were saved 
by the care of the Crown Prince of Prussia, 
and some vases, chairs and statues were ap- 
propriated and packed off across the Rhine as 
the plunder of war. 

The park of Saint Cloud to-day contains 
nearly four hundred hectares, the public park 
and the ^^ preserve." From it spreads out one 
of the loveliest panoramas in the neighbourhood 
of Paris, alleyed vistas leading seemingly to 
infinity, with a sprinkling of statues still flanking 
the Jardin du Trocadero. 

From the town one enters the park through 
a great iron gate from the Place Royale, or by 
the Avenue du Chateau, which lands one on 
the terraces where once stood the royal palace. 



240 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

From Ville d'Avray and from Sevres there 
are also entrances to the great park, while to 
the latter runs an avenue connecting the '^ pre- 
serve" of Saint Cloud with the wilder, more 
rugged Bois de Meudon. 

Actually the surroundings of Saint Cloud's 
great park are the least bit tawdry. Here and 
there are booths and tents selling trashy souve- 
nirs, and even more unpleasant-looking articles 
of food and drink, while fringing the river, and 
some of the principal avenues approaching the 
cascade, are more pretentious restaurants and 
eating houses which are royal in name and their 
prices if nothing else. 

The cascades are for the masses the chief 
sight of Saint Cloud to-day. Historical souvenir 
plays little part in the minds of those who only 
visit a monumental shrine to be amused, and so 
the falling waters of Saint Cloud's cascade, 
like the gushing torrents of Versailles' fountains, 
are the chief incentives to a holiday for tens of 
thousands of small Paris shopkeepers who do not 
know that a royal palace was ever here, much 
less that it had a history. 

There is an upper and a lower cascade, an arti- 
ficial water ingeniously tumbled about accord- 
ing to the conception of one Lepaute, an archi- 
tect of the time of the reign of Louis XIV. 




The Cascades at Saint Cloud 



St. Cloud and Its Park 241 

Mansart designed the architectural attributes 
of the lower cascade and scores considerably 
over his colleague. Circular basins and canals 
finally lead the water off to a still larger basin 
lower down where it spouts up into the air to a 
height of some forty odd metres at a high pres- 
sure. This is the official description, but it is 
hard to get up any sympathy or enthusiasm 
over the thing, either considered as a work of 
art or as a diversion. Frankly, then. Saint 
Cloud's chief charm is its site and its dead and 
half -forgotten history. The "Tramp Abroad" 
and "Rollo" and "Uncle George" knew it better 
than we, because in those days the palace existed 
in the real, whereas we take it all on faith and 
regret (sometimes) that we did not live a couple 
of generations ago. 

Bellevue, on the banks of the Seine, just be- 
fore reaching Saint Cloud, owes its origin (a 
fact which the great restaurant of the Pavilion 
Bleu has made the most of in its advertisements), 
to a caprice of Madame de Pompadour. She 
liked the point of view (as do so many diners 
on the restaurant terrace to-day), and built a 
^^ rendezvous-chateau^^ on the hillside, a half- 
way house, as it were, where Louis XV might 
be at his ease on his journeyings to and from 
the capital. 



242 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The Pompadour was able to borrow a force 
of eight hundred workmen from the king for as 
long as was necessary to carry out her ambitious 
projects at Bellevue and on November 25, 1750, 
she had a house-warming in her modest villa 
(demolished in 1794) and pendit la cremaillere 
with a ceremony whose chief entertainment 
was the dancing of a ballet significantly entitled 
''L'Amour Architect." 

Neighbouring upon Saint Cloud is a whole 
battery of hallowed, historical spots associated 
with the more or less royal dwellings of the French 
monarchs and their favourites. It was but a 
comparatively short distance to Versailles, to 
Saint Germain, to Maintenon and to Ram- 
bouillet, and the near-by Louveciennes was liter- 
ally strewn with the most charming country- 
houses, which, in many cases, kings paid for 
and made free use of, though indeed the accounts 
for the same may not have appeared in the public 
budgets, at least not under their proper names. 

At the summit of the hill which gives the town 
its name was a chateau belonging originally to 
Madame la Princesse de Conti, and opposite 
the railway station of to-day, with its prosaic 
and unlovely surroundings, was a magnificent 
property belonging to Marechal Magnan, and 
the Pavilion du Barry, built by the architect 



St. Cloud and Its Park 243 

Ledoux to the orders of Louis XV, who would 
provide a convenient nest in the neighbourhood 
of Saint Cloud for his latest favourite. To-day 
the pavilion exists in name, somewhat disfigured 
to be sure, but still reminiscent of its former 
rather garish outlines, so on the whole it cannot 
be said to have suffered greatly from an esthetic 
point of view. The property came finally to be 
included as a part of the estate of Pierre Laffitte, 
though still known, as it always has been, as the 
Pavilion du Barry. 



CHAPTER XV 

VERSAILLES: THE GLORY OF FRANCE 

" Glorieuse, monumentale et monotone 
La jagade de pierre efjrite, au vent qui passe 
Son chapiteau friable et sa guirlande lasse 
En face du pare jaune ou s'accoude Vautomne. 

«J> ^U ^L0 ^^ «J^ *^ 

Mais le soleil, aux vitres d'or qu'il incendie 

Y semhle rallumer interieurement 

Le sursautj chaqtie soir, de la Gloire engourdiJ\ 

These lines of Henri de Regnier explain the 
aspect of the Versailles of to-day better than any 
others ever written. 

Versailles is a medley of verdure, a hierarchy 
of bronze and a forest of marble. This is an 
expression full of anomalies, but it is strictly 
applicable to Versailles. Its waters, jets and 
cascades, its monsters, its Tritons and Valhalla 
of marble statues set off the artificial background 
in a manner only to be compared to a stage setting 
— a magnificent stage setting, but still palpably 
unreal. 

Yes, Versailles is sad and grim to-day; one 

244 



Versailles: The Glory of Prance 245 

hardly knows why, for its memories still live, and 
the tangible evidences of most of its great splen- 
dour still stand. 

" Void tes ijs en cone et tes tritons joufjlus 
Tes jar dins composes oil Louis ne vient plus, 
Et ta pompe arbor ant les plumes et les casques. ^^ 

It is not possible to give here either an archi- 
tectural review or a historical chronology of Ver- 
sailles; either could be made the raison d^etre 
for a weighty volume. 

The writer has confined himself merely to a 
more or less correlated series of patent facts and 
incidents which, of itself, shows well the futility 
of any other treatment being given of a subject 
so vast within the single chapter of a book. 

The history of Versailles is a story of the people 
and events that reflected the glory and grandeur 
of the Grand Monarque of the Bourbons and 
made his palace and its environs a more sublime 
expression of earthly pomp than anything which 
had gone before, or has come to pass since. 

Versailles, after its completion, became the 
perfect expression of the decadence and de- 
moralization of the old regime. It can only be 
compared to the relations between du Barry and 
the young Marie Antoinette, who was all that was 
contrary to all for which the former stood. 



246 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

That the court of Louis XV was artificially 
brilliant there is no doubt. It was this that made 
it stand out from the sombre background of the 
masses of the time. It was a dazzling, human 
spectacle, and Versailles, with its extravagant, 
superficial charms, carried it very near to the 
brink of ruin, though even in its most banal 
vulgarities there was a certain sense of ambitious 
sincerity. The people of the peasant class lived 
as animals, "black, livid and scorched by the 
sun." The sense of all this penetrated readily 
even to Versailles, so that La Pompadour or Louis, 
one or the other of them, or was it both together, 
cried out instinctively: ^^ Apres nous le deluged 

The intricacies of the etiquette of the daily life 
of the king, his follies and fancies, made the his- 
tory of Versailles the most brilliant of that of the 
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries — certainly 
it was the most opulent. The manners of the 
time were better than the morals, and if good 
taste in art and architecture had somewhat fallen 
there is no doubt but that a charming fantasy 
often made up for a lack of estheticism. 

The story of the palace, the park, the king and 
his court are so interwoven that no resume of the 
story of one can ignore that of any of the others. 
The king and court present themselves against 
this background with an intimacy and a clearness 



Versailles: The Glory of France 247 

which is remarkable for its appeal to one's curios- 
ity. It is a long, long day of life which begins 
with the petit lever and only ends with the grand 
coucher. 

If there was ever a Castle of Indolence and 
Profligacy it was Versailles, though indeed it is 
regarded as the monarchy's brilliant zenith. 
The picture is an unforgetable one to any who 
have ever read its history or seen its stones. 

In the year 1650, Martial de Lomenci, one of 
the ministers of Charles IX, was the Seigneur 
of Versailles, but at the will of Catherine de 
Medici he was summarily strangled that she 
might get possession of the property and make a 
present of it to her favourite, Albert de Gondi, 
Marechal de Retz. 

About 1625 Louis XIII had caused a small 
hunting pavilion to be built near by and, by de- 
grees, acquiring more land took it into his head to 
erect something more magnificent in the way of 
a country-house, though the real conception of a 
suburban Paris palace only came with Louis XIV. 

Levau, the latter's architect, made the neces- 
sary alterations to the structure already existing, 
and little by little the more magnificent project 
known in its completed form to-day was evolved. 
War not being actually in progress, or imminent, 
great bodies of soldiery were set at work with 



248 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

pick and shovel, and at one time thirty thousand 
had laid aside their sabres and muskets for the 
more peaceful art of garden-making under the 
direction of Le Notre. 

In three decades the sum total of the chief roll 
of expenses of the palace and its dependencies 
reached eighty-one million, one hundred and fifty- 
one thousand, four hundred and fourteen livres, 
nine sols and two denier s. It is perhaps even 
more interesting to know that of this vast sum 
more than three millions went for marble, twenty- 
one millions for masonry, two and a half mil- 
lions for the rougher woodwork and a like sum 
for marquetry. Other additional ^^ trifling" em- 
bellishments of Versailles and the Trianon dur- 
ing the same period counted up another six mil- 
lion and a half. 

The expense of these works was enormous 
on all sides. Water being required for the pur- 
pose of supplying the fountains it was proposed 
that the waters of the Eure should be turned from 
their original bed and made to pass through Ver- 
sailles, and the enterprise was actually begun. 
Beyond the gardens was formed the Little Park, 
about four leagues around, and beyond this lay 
the Great Park, measuring twenty leagues around 
and enclosing several forest villages. The total 
expenses of these works may never have been 



Versailles: The Glory of France 249 

exactly known, but they must have been immense, 
that is certain, and have even been estimated at 
as much as one billion francs. The works were 
so far completed in 1664 that the first Versailles 
fete was given to consecrate the palace. In honour 
of this event Moliere composed "La Princesse 
d'Elide." 

The improvements, however, were continued, 
and in 1670, Levau, dying, was succeeded by his 
nephew, Jules Hardouin Mansart, who wished 
to destroy the chateau of Louis XIII and erect 
one uniform building. Louis XIV, out of respect 
to his father, would not allow Mansart's project 
to be carried out and therefore alterations were 
only made in the court by surrounding it on the 
western side with the magnificent buildings now 
forming the garden front. The southern wing 
was subsequently added for the accommodation 
of the younger members of the royal family. 
In 1685 the northern wing was erected to meet 
the requirements of the attaches of the court. 
The chapel was commenced in 1699 and finished 
in 1710. 

Louis XIV took up his residence in the palace 
in 1 68 1 with Madame de Montespan, and, thirty- 
five years afterwards, died there, the reigning 
favourite then being Madame de Maintenon. 
During this time Versailles was the theatre of 



250 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

many extraordinary scenes. Louis XV was born 
here but did not take up his residence here until 
after he was of age. Here it was that his favourites 
Madame de Chateauroux, Madame de Pompa- 
dour and Madame du Barry found themselves 
most at home. It was under the direction of 
this monarch that the theatre was built in the 
northern wing, and was formally opened on the 
occasion of the marriage of the dauphin, Louis 
XVI, in 1770. 

Towards the end of the reign of Louis XV a 
new wing and pavilion were added on the northern 
side of the principal court, and it was proposed to 
build across the court a new front in the same 
uniform style. The idea could not be carried out 
in consequence of the troublous times of Louis 
XVI and, the enormous estimated expense. The 
Revolution intervened and Versailles remained 
closed until it was reopened by the first Napoleon, 
who, however, was unable to take up his residence 
in it on account of his frequent campaigns* afield. 

At the Restoration Louis XVIII, as the repre- 
sentative of the ancient monarchy, wished to 
make Versailles the seat of the court, but was de- 
terred from doing so by the appalling previous 
expense. During the reigns of both Napoleon 
and Louis XVIII considerable sums were ex- 
pended in its refurbishing so that it was not wholly 



Versailles: The Glory of Prance 251 

a bygone when finally the French authorities 
made of it, if not the chief, at least the most 
popular monument historique of all France. 

And yet the aspect of Versailles is sadly weary- 
ing. To-day Versailles is lonely; one is haunted 
by the silence and the bareness, if not actual 
emptiness. Only once in seven years does the 
old palace take on any air of the official life of the 
Republic, and that is when the two legislative 
bodies join forces and come to Versailles to vote 
for the new president. For the rest of the time 
it is deserted, save for the guardians and visitors, 
a memory only of the splendours imagined and 
ordained by Louis XIV. 

For nearly a century the master craftsmen of 
a nation conspired to its beatification, and cer- 
tainly for gorgeousness and extravagance Versailles 
has merited any encomiums which have ever 
been expended upon it. It was made and remade 
by five generations of the cleverest workers who 
ever lived, until it took supreme rank as the great- 
est storehouse of luxurious trifles in all the world. 

One wearies though of the straight lines and 
long vistas of Versailles, the endless repetition of 
classical motives, which, while excellent, each in 
its way, do pall upon one in an inexplicable fash- 
ion. It possesses, however, a certain dignity 
and grace in every line. This is a fact which 



252 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

one can not deny. It is expressive of — well, of 
nothing but Versailles, and the part it played 
in the life of its time. 

The millions for Versailles were obtained in 
ways too devious and lengthy to follow up here. 
Even Louis XIV began to see before the end the 
condition into which he had led the nation, though 
he punished every one who so much as hinted at 
his follies. Vauban, ^^the hero of a hundred 
sieges," published a book on the relations between 
the king and court and the tax-paying masses 
and was disgraced forever after, dying within 
a few months of a broken heart that he should 
have been so impotent in attempting to bring 
about a reform. 

The life of the king at Versailles had little of 
privacy in it. From his rising to his going to 
bed he was constantly in the hands of his valets 
and courtiers, even receiving ambassadors of 
state while he was still half hidden by the heavy 
curtains of his great four-poster. They had 
probably been waiting hours in the Salon de 
rOeil de Boeuf before being admitted to the 
kingly presence. 

It was at this period that Michael Chamillard, the 
Minister of War, introduced billiards into France 
by the way of Versailles. He played with Louis 
XIV and pleased him greatly, but Chamillard 



Versailles: The Glory of France 253 

was no statesman, as history and the following 
lines from his epitaph point out. 

" Ci git le jameux Chamillard 
De son Roy le pronotaire 
Qui jut un Jieros an hillard 
Un zero dans le Minis tere.^^ 

This apartment of the Oeil de Boeuf was the 
ancient Cabi du Conseil. It is a wonderfully 
decorated apartment, and its furnishings, beyond 
those which are actually built into the fabric, are 
likewise of a splendour and good taste which it 
is to be regretted is not everywhere to be noted in 
the vast palace of Louis XIV. The garnishings 
of the chimney-piece alone would make any great 
room interesting and well furnished, and the 
great golden clock, finely chiselled and brilliantly 
burnished, is about the most satisfactory French 
clock one ever saw, marking, as it does, in its 
style, the transition between that of Louis XIV 
and Louis XV. 

Versailles, in many respects, falls far short 
to-day of the ideal; its very bigness and bareness 
greatly detract from the value of the historic 
souvenir which has come down to us. Changes 
could undoubtedly be made to advantage, and 
to this point much agitation has lately been 
directed, particularly in cutting out some of the 



254 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

recently grown up trees which have spoiled the 
classic vistas of the park, and the removal of those 
ugly equestrian statues which the Monarchy of 
July erected. 

Versailles only came under Napoleon's cur- 
sory regard for a brief moment. He hardly 
knew whether he would care to make his home 
here or not, but ordered his architects to make 
estimates for certain projects which he had con- 
ceived and when he got them was so staggered 
at their magnitude that he at once threw over 
any idea that he may have had of making it his 
dwelling. 

The Revolution had stripped the palace quite 
bare; no wonder that the emperor balked at the 
cost of putting it in order. Napoleon may have 
had his regrets for he made various allusions 
to Versailles while exiled at Saint Helena, but 
then it was too late. 

Louis Philippe took a matter-of-fact view of 
the possible service that the vast pile might render 
to his family and accordingly spent much money 
in a great expanse of gaudy wall decorations 
which are there to-day, thinking to make of it a 
show place over which might preside the genius 
of his sons. 

These acres of meaningless battle-pieces, Al- 
gerian warfare and what not are characteristic 



Versailles: The Glory of France 255 

of the ''Citizen- King '* whose fondness for red 
plush, green repp and horsehair sofas was nota- 
ble. What he did at Versailles was almost 
as great a vandalism against art as that wrought 
by the Revolution. 

Last scene of all: — Under Lebrun's magnif- 
icent canopied ceiling, where the effigy of Louis 
XIV is being crowned by the Goddess of Glory, 
and the German eagle sits on a denuded tree 
trunk screaming in agony and beating his wings 
in despair, William of Prussia was proclaimed 
Emperor of United Germany. It was almost 
as great an indignity as France ever suffered; 
the only greater was when the Prussians marched 
through the Arc de Triomphe de I'Etoile. That 
was, and is, the Frenchman's — the Parisian's, 
at all events — culminating grief. 

The apartment referred to is the Grand Galerie 
des Glaces (or Galerie Louis XIV), which is 
accredited as one of the most magnificently ap- 
pointed rooms of its class in all the world. It 
is nearly two hundred and fifty feet in length, 
nearly forty feet in width, and forty-three feet 
in height. It is lighted by seventeen large arched 
windows, which correspond with arched niches 
on the opposite wall filled with mirrors — hence 
the name. 

Sixty Corinthian columns of red marble with 



256 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

bases and capitals of gilt bronze fill up the inter- 
vening wall spaces. The vaulted ceiling by Le- 
brun is divided into eighteen small compart- 
ments and nine of much larger dimensions, in 
which are allegorically represented the principal 
events in the history of Louis XIV, from the 
Peace of the Pyrenees to that of Nymeguen. 

It was in this splendid apartment that Louis 
XIV displayed the grandeur of royalty in its 
highest phase and such was the luxury of the times, 
such the splendour of the court, that its immense 
size could hardly contain the crowd of courtiers 
that pressed around the monarch. 

Several splendid fetes took place in this great 
room, of which those of the marriage of the Due 
de Bourgogne in 1697 and that given on the 
arrival of Marie Antoinette were the most brilliant. 

Following are three pen-pictures of this historic 
palace. 

The Versailles of Long Ago. It was to 
Versailles that the Grand Roi repaired after his 
stern chase of the Spaniards across Flanders; 
through the wood of Saint Germain and over 
those awful cobblestones which Parisians know 
so well to-day rolled the gilded carrosse of the 
king. He had already been announced by a 
runner who had also brought news of the latest 
victory. Courtiers and populace alike crowded 



Versailles: The Glory of France 257 

the streets of the town in an effort to acquire a 
good place from which to see the arrival of the 
king. Intendants and servitors were giving orders 
on all sides, frequently contradictory, and garden- 
ers were furbishing up the alleyed walks and 
flower beds in readiness for Sa Majeste Louis 
Quatorze and all his little world of satellites. A 
majestic effervescence bubbled over all, and the 
bourgeoisie enjoyed itself hugely, climbing even 
on roof-tops and gables in the town without the 
palace gates. 

The Roi Soleil came at last to his ^^well-beloved 
city of Versailles." ^^He arrived in a cloud of 
golden dust,'* said a writer of the time, and any 
who have seen Versailles blazing and treeless 
in the middle of a long, hot summer, will know 
what it was like on that occasion. 

Cannons roared, and the sound of revelry 
and welcoming joy was everywhere to be heard. 

The Versailles of Yesterday. The lu- 
gubrious booming of cannons came rolling over 
the meanderings of the Seine from the capital. 
The hard-heads of Paris would understand noth- 
ing; they would make flow never-ceasing rivers 
of blood. The national troops were well-nigh 
impotent; it was difficult to shoot down your own 
flesh and blood at any time; doubly so when your 
native land has not yet been evacuated by a ven- 



258 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

turesome enemy. It was the time of the Com- 
mune. Traffic at Versailles was of that inten- 
sity that circulation was almost impossible. In 
spite of a dismal April rain the tow^n was full of 
all sorts and conditions of men. The animation 
of the crowd was feverish, but it was without joy. 
A convoy of prisoners passed between two lines 
of soldiers with drawn bayonets. They were 
Frenchmen, but they were Communards. It was 
but a moment before they were behind the barred 
doors of the barracks which was to be their prison, 
packed like a troop of sheep for the slaughter. 
Versailles itself, the palace and the town, were 
still sad. The rain still fell in torrents. 

The Versailles of To-day. Roses, begonias, 
geraniums, the last of a long hot summer, still shed 
their fragrant memories over the park of Ver- 
sailles. In the long, sober alleys a few leaves had 
already dropped from the trees above, marking 
the greensward and the gravel like a tapis 
d' orient, red and green and gold. 

Flora and Bacchus in their fountains seemed 
less real than ever before, more sombre under the 
pale, trickling light through the trees. A few 
scattered visitors were about, sidling furtively 
around the Trianon, the Colonnade and the 
Bosquet d^Apollon; and the birds of the wood 
were even now bethinking of their winter pil- 



Versailles: The Glory of France 259 

grimage. Versailles was still sad. The last rays 
of the setting sun shot forth reflected gold from 
the windows of the chateau and soon the silver 
blue veil of a September twilight came down 
like a curtain of gauze. 

Versailles, the Versailles of other days, is gone 
forever. Who will awaken its echoes in after 
years? When will the Trianon again awake 
with the coquetries of a queen? When will the 
city of the Roi Soleil come again into its own 
proud splendour ? 

The sun has set, the great iron gates of the 
courtyard are closed, the palace and all therein 
sleeps. 

^' Alton nous en dHci: laissons la place aux 
ombres. ^^ 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE GARDENS OF VERSAILLES AND THE 
TRIANONS 

Versailles without its court of marble, its 
fountains, its gardens and its park, and the at- 
tendant Grand and Petit Trianons, would hardly 
have the attraction that it has to-day. 

The ensemble is something of more vast and 
varied extent than is to be seen elsewhere, though 
its aspect has somewhat changed from what it 
was of old, and the crowds of Sunday and holiday 
visitors give the courts and alleyed walks some- 
what the aspect of a modern amusement resort. 

The gardens of Versailles were but the fram- 
ing of a princely dwelling created to respond 
to the requirements of a court which was at- 
tempting to do things on a grand scale. Every- 
thing was designed with most magnificent out- 
lines; everything was royal, in all verity — archi- 
tecture, garden-making, fetes, receptions and 
promenades. What setting, then, could have 
been more appropriate to the life of the times? 

Versailles, the town, had never prospered, 

260 



The Gardens of Versailles 261 

and has never proved sufficiently attractive to 
become a popular suburb; and, though to-day 
it passed the mark of half a hundred thousand 
population, it never would have existed at all 
had it not been for the palace of Louis XIV. 

Were it not for the palace and its attributes, 
Versailles would have absolutely no memories 
for visitors, except such as may have lunched 
well at the Hotel des Reservoirs or the Hotel 
du Trianon. That is not everything, to be sure; 
but it is something, even when one is on an his- 
toric pilgrimage. 

Even in the day of Louis XVI the popular 
taste was changing and Versailles was con- 
temptuously referred to as a world of automota, 
of cold, unfeeling statuary and of Noah's Ark 
trees and forests. There was always a certain 
air of self-satisfaction about it, as there is, to-day, 
when the Parisian hordes come out to see the 
waters play, and the sight-seers marvel at the 
mock splendour and the scraps of history doled 
out for their delectation by none-too-painstaking 
guardians. 

In spite of all this, no sober-minded student of 
art or history will ever consider Versailles, the 
palace and the park, as other than a superb and a 
spectacular demonstration of the taste of the times 
in which it was planned, built and lived in. 



262 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Versailles was begun in 1624 by Louis XIII, 
who built here a humble hunting-lodge for the 
disciples of Saint Hubert of whom he was the 
royal head. So humble an erection was it that 
the monarch referred to it simply as a ^^ petite 
maison,^^ and paid for it out of his own pocket, 
a rare enough proceeding at that epoch. 

The critical Bassompierre called it a ^^chetif 
chateau j^^ and Saint-Simon referred to it as a 
"house of cards." Manifestly, then, it was no 
great thing. It was, however, a comfortable 
country-house, surrounded by a garden and a 
more ample park. 

It was not Lemercier, the presiding genius 
of the Louvre at this time, but an unknown 
by the name of Le Roy, whom Louis XIII chose 
as his architect. 

Boyceau traced the original parterres with a 
central basin at a crossroads of two wide avenues. 
Each of the four compartments thus made was 
ornamented with broderies and trimmed hedges, 
and the open spaces were ingeniously filled with 
parti-coloured sands, or earth. A parterre of 
flowers immediately adjoined the palace and 
rudimentary alleys and avenues stretched off 
towards the wood. Although designed by Boy- 
ceau, this work was actually executed by his 
nephew, Jacques de Menours, who, with diffi- 



The Gardens of Versailles 263 

culty, collected his pay. His books of account 
showed that in five years, from 1631 to 1636, 
he had drawn but once a year a sum varying 
from fifteen hundred to four thousand livres 
while in the same period the king had spent 
on the rest of the work at Versailles two hundred 
and thirty-eight thousand livres, thirty-two sols, 
six deniers, nearly one million one hundred 
thousand francs of the money of to-day. 

The first of the outdoor embellishments of 
the palace at Versailles is the great Cour Royale, 
or the Cour d'Honneur, which opens out behind 
the long range of iron gates facing upon the 
Place d'Armes. At the foot of this entrance 
court is an extension called the Cour de Marbre. 
This Cour de Marbre, on January 5, 1757, was 
the scene of the infamous attack on Louis XV 
by Damiens, just as the king was starting out 
for the Trianon. 

A thick redingote saved the king's life; but 
for ^'ihis mere pin-prick," according to Vol- 
taire, the monarch went immediately to bed, 
and five times in succession sought absolution 
for his sins. Sins lay heavy even on royal heads 
in those days. 

Damiens was but a thick-witted, superstitious 
valet, who, more or less persecuted by the noble 
employers with whom he had been in service 



264 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

at various times, sought to avenge himself, not 
on them, but on their king, as the figurehead 
of all that was rotten in the social hierarchy. 
Louis, heretofore known as the "Bien Aime,'' 
had become suddenly unpopular because of 
the disastrous war against England and Ger- 
many, and his prodigal dissipation of public 
moneys. 

Stretching out behind the palace are the famous 
gardens, the parterres^ the tapis vert, the foun- 
tains and the grand canal, with the park of the 
Trianons off to the right. 

Good fortune came to Louis XIV when he 
found Andre Le Notre, for it was he and no other 
who traced the general lines of the garden of the 
Versailles which was to be. He laid a generous 
hand upon the park and forest which had sur- 
rounded the manor of Louis XIII, and extended 
the garden to the furthermost limits of his in- 
genuity. Modifications were rapid, and from 
1664 the parterres and the greensward took on 
entirely new forms and effects. The Parterre 
des Reservoirs became the Parterre du Nord, 
and an alley of four rows of lindens enclosed 
the park on all sides. The Parterre ^ Fleurs, 
or the Jardin du Roy, between the chateau and 
the Orangerie, was laid out anew. 

By the following year the park began to take 




•^ 

^ 

•s 

•^ 



^ 



■^ 



The Gardens of Versailles 265 

on the homogeneity which it had hitherto lacked. 
The great Rondeau, as it was called, and which 
became later the Bassin du Dragon, was exca- 
vated, and the Jardin Bas, or the Nouveau Par- 
terre, with an oval depression, was also planned. 

At one end of the park was the celebrated 
Menagerie du Roy, where the rare and exotic 
animals collected by the monarch had "a palace 
more magnificent than the home of any other 
dumb animals in the world.'' This was the 
first period of formal garden construction at 
Versailles, and it was also the period when the 
first great impetus was given to sculptural decora- 
tion. 

In 1679, following a journey in Italy, Le Notre 
took up again the work on the gardens at Ver- 
sailles, devoting himself to the region south of the 
palace which hitherto had been ignored. This 
was Le Notre's most prolific period. 

The creations at Versailles can be divided 
into two distinct epochs, that before 1670 and 
that coming after. After Le Notre's generous 
design, the king and queen were seemingly never 
satisfied with the endless plotting and planting 
which was carried on beneath the windows of 
the palace, and in many instances changed the 
colour schemes and even the outlines of Le Notre's 
original conceptions. 



266 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The Versailles of to-day is no longer the Ver- 
sailles of Louis XIII, so far as the actual dis- 
position of details goes. Then there was very 
little green grass and much sand and gravel, a 
scheme of decoration which entered largely into 
the seventeenth century garden. This refers 
principally to the general effect, for Le Notre 
made much use of the enclosing battery of lindens, 
chestnuts and elms of a majestic and patriarchal 
grandeur which have since been cut and re- 
placed by smaller species of trees, or not replaced 
at all. 

No sooner were the ornamental gardens planned 
at Versailles than the Potager du Roy, or fruit 
and vegetable garden, was created. This same 
garden exists to-day with almost its former out- 
lines. Here a soil sufficiently humid, and yet 
sufficiently well drained, contributed not a little 
towards the success of this most celebrated of 
all kitchen gardens the world has known. 

The work of installing a further system of 
artificial drainage was immediately begun, and 
the Eaux des Suisses was created, to take the 
place of a former stagnant pool near by. Un- 
doubtedly it was a stupendous work, like all the 
projects launched with regard to Versailles, but, 
like the others, it was brought to a speedy and 
successful conclusion. The details of the history 



The Gardens of Versailles 267 



of this royal vegetable garden are fully set forth 
in a work published in 1690 by the son of the 
designer, the Abbe Michel de la Quintinye, in 
two bulky volumes. ''It was meet that a royal 
vegetable garden should have been designed 
by a 'Gentleman Gardener/" said the faithful 
biographer in his foreword, and as such the man 
and the work are to be considered here. 

The work was accomplished by the combined 
efforts of a gracious talent and the expenditure 
of much money, put at La Quintinye's disposi- 
tion by his royal master, who had but to put his 
hand deep into the coffers of the royal treasury 
to draw it forth filled with gold. Critics have 
said that La Quintinye's ability stopped with 
the preparation of the soil, and with the design 
of the garden, rather than with the actual cultiva- 
tion, but at all events it was he who made the 
garden possible. 

La Quintinye adopted Arnauld d'Andilly's 
method of planting fruit trees en espalier by 
training them against a wall-like background, 
and to accomplish this divided the garden plot, 
which covered an area of eight hectares (twenty 
acres), into a great number of subdivisions en- 
closed by walls, in order to multiply to as great 
an extent as possible the available space to be 
used for the espaliers. Again, these same walls 



268 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

served to shelter certain varieties which were 
planted close against them. If this Potager 
du Roy was not actually the first garden of its 
class so laid out, it was certainly one of the most 
extensive and the most successful up to that 
time. 

The great terraces of at least two metres in 
width surrounded the central garden, leaving 
a free area for the latter which approximated 
three hectares. 

These terraces were divided into twenty-eight 
compartments, forming nine distinct varieties 
of gardens. 

The celebrated gardener of Louis XIV sought 
not only to obtain fruits and vegetables of a 
superior quality and an abundant quantity, but 
was the first among his kind to produce early 
vegetables, or primeurs, in any considerable 
quantity, and, by a process of forced culture, he 
was able to put upon the table of the monarch 
asparagus in December, lettuce in January, 
cauliflower in March and strawberries in April. 
All these may be found at the Paris markets 
to-day, and at these seasons, but the growing of 
primeurs for the Paris markets has become a 
great industry since the time it was first begun at 
Versailles. 

Of asparagus La Quintinye said, "It is a 



The Gardens of Versailles 269 

vegetable that only kings can ever hope to eat." 
The Potager du Roy was begun in 1678, and 
completed in 1683. It cost, all told, one million 
one hundred and seventy thousand nine hundred 
and eighty-three livres of which four hundred 
and sixty-seven thousand three hundred and sixty- 
four went for constructions in brick and stone, 
walls, enclosures and drains. Its annual main- 
tenance (1685) amounted to twenty thousand 
nine hundred and ninety-nine livres. The effort 
proved one of great benefit to its creator, for 
La Quintinye, at the completion of this work, 
received further commissions of a like nature 
from the Prince de Conde, the Due de Montansier, 
Colbert, Fouquet and others. 

So great a marvel was this vegetable garden 
at Versailles that it was the object of a pilgrimage 
of the Doge of Venice in 1685, and of the Siamese 
ambassadors in the following year. The garden 
has been preserved as an adjunct to Versailles 
up to the present day. For two centuries its 
product went to the '^Service de Bouche" of the 
chief of state, that is, the royal dinner table; 
but in 1875 the Minister of Agriculture installed 
there the French National Horticultural College, 
which to-day, with a widened scope, has admitted 
ornamental plants and trees to this famous gar- 
den. Nevertheless the general outlines have been 



270 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

preserved, though certain of the terraces have 
disappeared, as well as many of the walls of the 
original enclosure, thus reducing the number 
of garden plots; in fact but sixteen distinctly 
defined gardens remain, including the Clos aux 
Asperges. 

The general lines of the garden design of Le 
Notre and Boyceau at Versailles are to be noted 
to-day, but if anything the maintenance of the 
gardens is hardly the equal of what it was in the 
time of Louis XIV and a seeming disaster has 
fallen upon Versailles as these lines are being 
written. 

The military authorities have set aside, as a 
site for an aerostation camp, some twenty-five 
acres of the park near Rocquencourt. This 
is one of the loveliest parts, shaded by magnif- 
icent trees which, presumably, will have to be 
sacrificed, since, if left standing, they would 
certainly interfere with maneuvering with mili- 
tary aeroplanes, dirigibles and balloons. 

At a time when deforestation is recognized 
to be one of the greatest dangers that menace 
a country's prosperity, one of its consequences 
being such inundations as those which recently 
devastated Paris and the Seine valley, it is re- 
grettable that the forest surrounding Versailles 
should be depleted. 




JARDIK POTAGER DU ROV AVERSAILiLES(XX CENTURV; 



The Pota^er du Roy, Versailles 



The Gardens of Versailles 271 

Furthermore, the reahzation of the project 
means a loss of revenue to the state which at 
present derives some sixty thousand francs a 
year from the farming lease of this portion of 
the park. 

Therefore, for material considerations, as well 
as because Versailles and its surroundings should 
be preserved intact as a noble relic of one of the 
grandest periods of French history, one of the 
most beautiful creations of French genius, the 
project attributed to the military authorities is 
short-sighted. To diminish the attractions of 
Versailles would certainly prove an unwise policy, 
as the stream of tourists, which is the chief source 
of profit to Versailles and its population, would 
inevitably be diverted to some other channel. 

Only a short time ago a Societe des Amis de 
Versailles was created for the purpose of safe- 
guarding its artistic and natural beauties. The 
government gave the organization its approba- 
tion and there is something delightfully ironical 
in the fact that the military authorities of the same 
government are planning to destroy what the 
society, fathered by the Ministere des Beaux 
Arts, was formed to preserve. 

Another modern aspect of the park of Ver- 
sailles was noted during the late winter when, 
after a sharp freeze, all the youth of Paris had 



272 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

seemingly gone out to Versailles for the skating 
only to be met by a freshly-posted notice which 
read: 

Defense 

De Patiner Par 

Arrete du 17 Decembre, 1849 

These signs were posted here and there about 
the park, in the courtyard, on the postern gate, 
on trees, everywhere. The authorities were 
bound that there should be no flagrant violation 
of the order of 1849. 

"You see," said one of the park guardians, 
^^c'est defendu; but as we are only two and the 
crowd is very large we can do nothing." This 
was evident. Thousands overran the Grand 
Canal, which at its greatest depth was scarcely 
more than a yard to the bottom, and so, despite 
of monarchial decree, Republican France still 
skates on the ornamental waters of Versailles 
when occasion offers. 

'^N^oubliez pas le petit balayeur^ sHl vous 
plait, ^^ was as often heard as *^Allez vous-en,^^ 

On the whole it was rather a picturesque 
sight. A thick haze hung over the now white 
"Tapis Vert," and the nude figures of the Bassin 
d'ApoUon were clothed in a mantle of snow, 
while the white-robed statues of the Allee Royale, 




^5: 



o 






The Gardens of Versailles 273 

one could well believe, shivered as one passed. 

The fountains of Versailles, the ^'Grands 
Eaux'' and "Petits Eaux," which shoot their 
jets in air '^semi-occasionally" for the benefit 
of Paris's ^^good papas" and their children, 
are distinctly popular features, and of an artistic 
worth neither less nor greater than most garden 
accessories of the artificial order. The fact 
that it costs something like ten thousand francs 
to '^play" these fountains seems to be the chief 
memory which one retains of them in operation, 
unless it be the crowds which make the going 
and coming so uncomfortable. 

The Orangerie lies just below the terrace of 
the Parterre du Midi, and a thousand or more 
non-bearing orange trees are scattered about. 
They are descendants of fifteenth century ances- 
tors, it is claimed — but doubtfully. 

The great basin of water known as the Eaux 
des Suisses was excavated by the Swiss Guard 
of Louis XIV to serve the useful purpose of 
irrigating the Potager du Roy, and as a decora- 
tive effect of great value to that part of the garden 
upon which faces the fourteen-hundred-foot front 
of the palace. 

Still farther off towards the Bois de Satory, 
after crossing the Tapis Vert, lie the famous 
Bassins de Latone and Apollon, the Bassin du 



274 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Miroir and, finally, the Grand Canal, with one 
transverse branch leading to the Menagerie 
(now the government stud-farm) and the other 
to the Trianons. 

The satellite palaces known as the Grand 
and Petit Trianons are, like the Palace of Ver- 
sailles itself, of such an abounding historical 
interest that it were futile to attempt more than 
a mere intimation of their comparative rank 
and aspect. 

The rather sprawling, one-story, horseshoe- 
shaped villa built by Louis XIV for Madame 
de Maintenon, and known as the Grand Trianon, 
was an architectural conception of Mansart's. 

It is worth remarking that the Grand Trianon, 
to-day, is in a more nearly perfect state than it 
has been for long past, for the restorations lately 
made have removed certain interpolations mani- 
festly out of place. 

It is due to M. de Nolhac, the Conservateur 
du Musee de Versailles, that this happy amel- 
ioration has been brought about and that Man- 
sart's admirable work is again as it was in the 
days of Madame de Maintenon and those of the 
later Napoleon I. 

In spite of all this the Trianon of to-day 
is not what it was in the eighteenth century. 
"Madame de Maintenon," said de Musset, 



'^!^im^-;x .:v^''^-w>'^«sim^m^y^'^: 






i-ier'-i: '.- ' • ^^-^iCi*----?:-" 




The Fountain of Neptune, Versailles 





274 R oyal Palaces and Parks of France 

Miroir and, finally, the Grand Canal, with one 
transverse branch leading to the Menagerie 
(now the government stud-farm) and the other 
to the Trianons. 

The satellite palaces known as the Grand 
and Petit Trianons are, like the Palace of Ver- 
sailles itself, of such an abounding historical 
interest that it were futile to attempt more than 
a mere intimation of their comparative rank 
and aspect. 

The rather sprawling, one-story, horseshoe- 
shaped villa built by Louis XIV for Madame 
de Maintenon, and known as the Grand Trianon, 
was an architectural conception of Mansart's. 

#!§^^tIf^¥fflteBnf tflS?Tm\3^ Trianon, 
to-day, is in a more nearly perfect state than it 
has been for long past, for the restorations lately 
made have removed certain interpolations mani- 
festly out of place. 

It is due to M. de Nolhac, the Conservateur 
du Musee de Versailles, that this happy amel- 
ioration has been brought about and that Man- 
sart'S admirable work is again as it was in the 
days of Madame de Maintenon and those of the 
later Napoleon I. 

In spite of all this the Trianon of to-<iay 
is not what it was in the eighteenth cent ■'> 
** Madame de Maintenon," said de ^^ . 



The Gardens of Versailles 275 

"made of Versailles an oratory, but La Pompa- 
dour turned it into a boudoir.'^ He also called 
the Trianon: "a tiny chateau of porcelain." 
It was, too, the boudoir of Madame de Mon- 
tespan. 

Louis XV, too, 'built, or furnished, discreet 
boudoirs of this order on every hand. More 
than one great gallery in which his elders had 
done big things he divided and subdivided into 
minute apartments and papered the walls, or 
painted them, all colours of the rainbow, or hung 
them with silks or velvets. 

"Don't you think my little apartment shows 
good taste," he asked one day of the Comtesse 
de Seran at Versailles. 

"Not at all," she replied, "I would much 
rather that the walls were hung in blue." 

That particular apartment was in rose, but, 
since blue was the favourite colour of the monarch, 
the reply was but flattering. The next time 
that his friend, the Comtesse, appeared on the 
scene the apartment had all been done over in 
blue. 

The monarch soon began to turn his attention 
to the gardens. Bowers, labyrinths and vases 
and statues were inexplicably mixed as in a maze. 
He began to have the ^^ gout pastoral ^^^ his biogra- 
pher has said, a vogue that Madame du Barry 



276 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

and Marie Antoinette came in time to push to 
its limits. 

The king was too ready to admire all that 
was suggested, all that was offered, and the ulti- 
mate effect was — well, it was the opposite of 
what he hoped it to be, though doubtless he did 
not realize it. 

In the garden of the Grand Trianon is a great 
basin with a cascade flowing down over a sort 
of a high altar arrangement in red and white 
marble called the Buffet de FArchitecture, and 
evolved by Mansart. This architect certainly 
succeeded much better with his purely architec- 
tural conceptions than he did with interpolated 
decorative elements intended to relieve a formal 
landscape. 

The Petit Trianon, the pride of Louis XV, 
was designed by the architect Gabriel, and its 
reigning goddess was Marie Antoinette. Souve- 
nirs of the unhappy queen are many, but the 
caretakers are evidently bored with their duties 
and hustle you through the apartments with 
scant ceremony that they may doze again un- 
disturbed in their corners. 

The garden of the Petit Trianon is a veritable 
Jardin Anglais, that is, the decorative portion, 
where sweeps and curves, as meaningless as 
those one sees on banknotes and no more decora- 




O 






The Gardens of Versailles 



277 



tive, are found in place of the majestic lines of 
the formal garden when laid out after the French 
manner. 

The Hameau, where is the dairy where the 
queen played housewife and shepherdess, is 
just to the 
rear of this 
bijou palace 
and looks 
stagy and un- 
real enough 
to be the 
wings and 
back-drop of 
a pastoral 
play. 

Near Ver- 
sailles was 
the Chateau 
de Clagny, 
with a gar- 
den laid out 

by Le Notre, quite the rival of many better known. 
Of it Madame de Sevigne wrote: ^^It is the 
Palais d'Armide; you know the manner of Le 
Notre; here he has done his best." 

The Couvent des Recollettes, just across the 
Bois de Satory, was built by Louis XIV out of 




278 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

regard for the religieux whom he displaced from 
an edifice which stood upon a plot which was 
actually needed for the palace gardens. The 
Chateaux of Noisy and Molineaux were also 
afiiliated with Versailles. 

The rest of the surroundings and accessories 
of Versailles are mere adjunctive details of those 
chief features here mentioned. To catalogue 
them even would be useless since they are all 
set down in the guidebooks. 



CHAPTER X\TI 

SAINT GERMAIN-EN-LAYE 

Saint Germain has not the popularity of 
Versailles, nor the charm of Fontainebleau, but 
it is more accessible than either, and, if less known 
and less visited by the general mass of tourists, 
it is all the more delightful for that. 

Saint Germain, the chateau, the town and 
the forest, possess a magnificent site. Behind 
is a wooded background, and before one are the 
meanderings of the Seine which in the summer 
sunlight is a panorama which is to be likened to 
no other on earth. Across the river bottom 
run the great tree-lined roadways, straight as 
the proverbial flight of the arrow, while on the 
horizon, looking from the celebrated terrace, one 
sees to-day the silhouetted outline of Paris with 
the Tour Eiffel and the dome of the Sacre Coeur 
as the culminating points. 

The town itself is ugly and ill-paved, and 
heavy-booted dragoons make a hideous noise 
as they clank along to and from the cavalry 
barracks all through the day and night. Neither 

279 



280 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 



are scorching automobiles making their ways 
to Trouville and Dieppe over the *' Route des 
Quarante Sous'^ a pleasant feature. One can 




•SAIMT* GELRJvIAIJMcI^ 



ignore all these things, however, for what is left is 
of a superlative charm. 

Saint Germain-en-Laye in the first stages of 
French history was but a vast extent of forest 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 281 

which under Charlemagne came to the possession 
of the monks of the Abbaye de Saint Germain- 
des-Pres. The first royal palace here was built 
by King Robert in the tenth century, practically 
upon the site of the present edifice. In the 
eleventh century there came into being another 
royal dwelling, and in the twelfth century Lou is- 
le- Gros built a chateau-fort as a protection to 
the royal residence and monastery. This did 
not prevent the Black Prince from very nearly 
burning them down on one of his bold raids, 
but by 1367, Charles V re-erected the ^^casteV^ 
of Saint Germain-en-Laye. 

The English, by coercion, induced a monk 
of a neighbouring establishment at Nanterre 
to deliver up a set of false keys by which the 
great gates of the castle were surreptitiously 
opened, and, for a time, the descendants of 
the Conqueror held possession. 

The establishment of Charles V in no way 
satisfying the artistic ambitions of Francis I, 
that monarch gave the task of reconstruction 
to the architect Pierre Chambiges, in 1539, pre- 
serving only the Saint Chapelle of Saint Louis 
and the donjon. 

The building must have gone forward with an 
extreme rapidity for at the architect's death, in 1544, 
it had reached nearly the level of the rooftop. 



282 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Chambiges' successor was his son-in-law, Guil- 
laume Guillain, who, without changing the primi- 
tive plan, completed the work in 1548. 

Saint Germain, above the first story, is es- 
sentially a construction of bricks, but the effect 
is even now, as Chambiges originally intended, 
an edifice with its main constructive elements 
of lower sustaining walls and buttresses of stone 
binding together the slighter fabric, or filling, 
above. Although it is Renaissance through and 
through. Saint Germain shows not the slightest 
reminiscence of anything Italian and must be 
considered entirely as an achievement of French 
genius. 

This edifice of Francis I was more a fortress 
than a palace in spite of its decorative features, 
and Henri II, desiring something more of a 
luxurious royal residence, began what the his- 
torians and savants know as the Chateau Neuf 
— the palace of to-day which stands high on the 
hill overlooking the winding Seine, to which se- 
ducing stream the gardens originally descended 
in terraces. 

Chiefly it is to Henri IV that this structure 
owes its distinction, for previously work went 
on but intermittently, and very slowly. Henri 
rV brought the work to completion and made 
the chateau his preferred and most prolonged 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 283 

place of residence, as indeed did his successor. 

It is the Chateau Neuf of the time of Henri IV 
which is to-day known as the Palais de Saint Ger- 
main-en-Laye. Of the Vieux Chateau only some 
fragmentary walls and piles of debris, the Pavilion 
Henri IV, and, in part, the old royal chapel remain. 

Actually the structure of to-day includes that 
part of the Hotel du Pavilion Henri IV which 
is used as a restaurant. 

Henri IV and Louis XIII gave Saint Germain 
its first great eclat as a suburban place of so- 
journ, and from the comings and goings of the 
court of that time there gradually grew up the 
present city of twenty thousand inhabitants; 
not all of them of courtly manners, as one learns 
from a recollection of certain facts of contem- 
porary modern history. 

During the days when Mazarin actually held 
the reins of state the court was frequently at 
Saint Germain. Louis XIV was born here, and 
until Versailles and Marly came into being he 
made it his principal dwelling. 

It was in one of the magnificent apartments, 
too, midway between the angle turrets of the 
facade, Louis XIII ended his unhappy exist- 
ence in 1642. His own private band of musicians 
played a "De Profundis" of his own composi- 
tion to waft his soul on its long journey. 



284 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The chroniclers describe one of the monarches 
last conversations as follows: ^'When they trans- 
port my body to Paris after my soul has flown, 
Laporte, remember that place where the road 
turns under the hill; it is a rough road, Laporte, 
and will surely shake my bones sadly if the driver 
does not go slowly." 

Those who have journeyed out from Paris 
to Saint Germain by road in this later century 
will appreciate the necessity for the admonition. 

Louis XIV, unlike Louis XIII, detested Saint 
Germain beyond words, because the towers of 
the Abbaye de Saint Denis, where he was destined 
one day to be buried, were visible from the ter- 
race. Louis XV was not so particular for he 
was so morbid that he even loved, as he claimed 
himself, the scent of new-made graves. 

The arrival of Anne d'Autriche and the royal 
family at Saint Germain during the war of the 
Fronde was one of the most dramatic incidents 
of the period. They had travelled half the night, 
coming from the Palais Royal only to find a palace 
awaiting them which was unheated and un- 
furnished though the time was mid- January. 
Always drear and gaunt it was immeasurably 
so on this occasion. Mazarin had made no 
provision for the queen's arrival; there were 
neither beds, tables nor linen in their proper 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 285 

places, no servants, no attendants of any kind, 
only the guardians of the palace. The queen 
was obliged to take rest from her fatigue on a 
folding camp bedstead, without covering of any 
kind. The princes fared no better, actually 
sleeping on the floor. 

There were plenty of mirrors and much gold 
gingerbread on the walls and ceilings, but no 
furniture. The personal belongings which the 
court had brought with them were few. No 
one had a change of clothing even; those worn 
one day were washed the next. However the 
queen good-naturedly smiled through it all. 
She called it ^'an escapade which can hardly 
last a week." 

All Paris was by this time crying "Vive la 
Fronde ^^: "Mart a Mazarin:''^ but it proved 
to be something more than a little affair of a week, 
as we now know. 

At this period, when Anne d'Autriche was 
practically a prisoner at Saint Germain, the 
picture made by the old chateau against its 
forest background was undeniably more im- 
posing than that which one sees to-day. The 
glorious forest was not then hidden by rows 
of banal rooftops, and the dull drabs of barracks 
and prisons. 

In the warm spring mornings the glittering 



286 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

fa5:ade of the chateau was brilHant as a diamond 
against its setting, and the radiating avenues 
of the park leading from the famous terrace 
stretched out into infinite vistas that were most 
alluring. This effect, fortunately, is not wholly 
lost to-day. 

At night things were as idyllic as by day. The 
queen and her ladies, relieved of the dreary pres- 
ence of the king who still remained at Paris, 
revelled in an unwonted freedom. Concerts, 
suppers and dances were the rule and moon- 
light cavalcades to the heart of the forest, or 
promenades on foot the length of the terrace, 
and by some romantically disposed couples far 
beyond, gave a genuine ''begone, dull care" 
aspect to court life which was not at all possible 
in the capital. 

The following picture, taken from a court 
chronicle, might apply as well to-day if one 
makes due allowance for a refulgence of myriad 
lamps gleaming out Parisward as night draws in. 

''It is a rare moonlight night. The queen 
and her ladies have emerged late on the stately 
terrace of Henri IV which borders upon the 
forest and extends for nearly a league along the 
edge of the height upon which stands the chateau. 

"The queen and her brother-in-law, Gaston, 
Due d' Orleans, have seated themselves some- 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 287 



what apart from the rest beside the stone balus- 
trade which overlooks the steep descent to the 
plain below. Vineyards line the hillside and 
the Seine flows far beneath, the fertile river- 
bottom rich with groves and orchards, villas 
and gardens. Still more distant sweeps away 
the great plain wrapped in dark shadows punc- 
tuated here and there with great splotches of 
moonlight. Of the great city beyond (the Paris 
of to-day, whose myriad glow-worm lights actually 
do lend an additional charm) not a vestige is to 
be seen. Scarcely a lantern marks the existence 
of a living soul in the vast expanse below, but 
the moon, high in the heavens, plots out the entire 
landscape with a wonderful impressiveness, and 
the stars topping the forest trees to the rear 
and the heights which rise on the distant horizon 
lend their quota of romanticism, and, as if by 
their scintillations, mark the almost indiscernible 
towers of the old Abbey of Saint Denis to the 
left. 

" 'Oh, what a lovely night,' said the queen 
to her companion. Again it is the old chronicler 
who speaks. 'Can the world ever appear so 
calm and peaceful elsewhere?' " 

This Terrasse de Henri IV, so called, is one 
of the most splendid and best-known terraces 
in Europe, and is noted for its extent as well 



288 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

as for its marvellous point of view, the whole 
panorama Parisward being spread out before 
one as if on a map, a view which extends from 
the Chateau de Maisons on the left to the Aque- 
duct de Marly and the heights of Louveciennes 
on the right, including the Bois de Vesinet, Mont 
Valerian, Montmartre and the whole Parisian 
panorama as far as the Coteaux de Montmorency. 

This terrace, too, was the project and con- 
struction of Le Notre in 1672. It is two and a 
half kilometres in length and thirty metres in 
width, upheld by a stone retaining wall which 
is surmounted by a balustrade. It extends from 
the Pavilion Henri IV to a gun battery well within 
the confines of the forest. Entrance from the 
precincts of the palace is by the great ornamental 
iron gateway known as the Grille Royale, from 
which an alleyed row of lindens leads to the 
heart of the forest. 

The record of another merry party at Saint 
Germain is that which recounts that summer 
evening when the king and court scuttled about 
the park enjoying themselves as only royalty 
can — when some one else pays the bills. The 
terrace, the gravelled walks and the alleyed 
paths of the forest all led to charming and dis- 
creet rendezvous. 

So preoccupied was every one on this particular 




The Valley of the Seine, from the Terrace 
at Saint Cermain 



288 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 



as for its marvellous point . sew, the whole 
panorama Parisward being spread out before 
one as if on a map, a view whicli extends from 
the Chateau de Maisons on the left to the Aque- 
duct de Marly and the heights of J .ouveciennes 
on the right, including the Bois de Vesinet, Mont 
Valerian, Montmartre and the whole Parisian 
panorama as far as the Coteaux de Montmorency. 

This terrace, too, was the project and con- 
struction of Le Notre in 1672. It is two and a 
half kilometres in length and thirty metres in 
width, upheld by a stone retaining wall which 
is surmounted by a balustrade. It extends from 
the Pavilion Henri IV to a gun battery well within 
tl^i^9i^r^^Tieh^n(^e§R^\f^SaW^e3#?m the 
precincts of tl;\\j^f^Qe^j^j^^v^e great ornamental 
iron gateway known as the Grille Royale, from 
which an alleyed row of lindens leads to the 
heart of the forest. 

The record of another merry party at Saint 
Germain is that which recounts that summer 
evening when the king and court scuttled about 
the park enjoying themselves as only royalty 
can — when some one el-ie pays the bills. The 
terrace, the gravelled walks antJ the alleyed 
paths of the forest all led to charming and dis- 
creet rendezvous. 

So preoccupied was every uul uii ibis particular 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 289 

occasion that the merry-makers had hardly a 
thought for their king, who, left to his own devices, 
sought out four maids of honour gossiping in a 
bower, and, taking the mischief-loving Lauzan 
into his confidence, pried upon them in the am- 
bush of the night. They were gossiping over 
the dancers at the ball of the night before when 
one of them proclaimed her fancy for the agility 
and grace of the king above all others. It was 
the first expression of ^'La Valliere" since she 
had come timidly to court. The rest is an idyll 
which is found set forth in all the history books 
at considerable length, and at this particular 
moment it was a genuine idyll, for the king 
had not then become the debauched roue that 
he was in later life. 

After Anne d'Autriche, Henriette, the widow 
of Charles I of England, found at Saint Germain 
a comfortable and luxurious refuge. 

From 1 66 1 onward Louis XIV made frequent 
visits to Saint Germain and was so taken with the 
charms of the neighbourhood and the immediate site 
that he conjured six and a half million francs out of 
his Civil List, in addition to his regular stipend, for 
the upkeep of this palace alone. This was robbery : 
modern graft pales before this; candelabra by the 
pound and writing tables by the square yard were 
known before the days of machine politicians. 



290 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

James II of England, in 1688, found a hospit- 
able refuge at Saint Germain, thanks to Louis 
XIV, and died within the palace walls in 1701, 
as did his wife, Maria d'Este, in 1718. 

Louis XV and Louis XVI gave Saint Germain 
scarce a thought, and under the Empire it became 
a cavalry school, and later, under the Restora- 
tion, sinking lower still, it merited only the de- 
nomination of a barracks. Its culminating fall 
arrived when it was turned into a penitentiary. 

Napoleon III, with finer instincts, here in- 
stalled a museum, and restorations and rebuild- 
ing having gone on intermittently since that 
time the palace has now taken on a certain 
pretence to glory. Practically the palace in its 
present form is a restoration, not entirely a new 
building, but a rebuilding of an old one, first 
begun under the competent efforts of the archi- 
tect Eugene Millet, who sought to reestablish 
the edifice as it was under Francis I. The great 
tower has been preserved but the corner pavilions 
of the period of Louis XIV have been demolished 
in accord with the carrying out of this plan. 

For forty years Saint Germain has been in a 
state of restoration, and like the restoration of 
Pierrefonds it has swallowed up fantastic sums. 
The western facade has been rebuilt from the 
chapel to the entrance portal and the last of 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 291 

Mansart's pavilions, which he built to please 
either his own fancy or that of Louis XIV, have 
been demolished. Mansart himself made way 
with the old totirelles and the balustrade which 
rounded off the angles of the walls of the main 
buildings and substituted a series of heavy, 
ugly maisonettes^ more like the bastions of a 
fortress than any adjunct to a princely dwelling. 

The courtyard of the chateau is curiously 
disposed; "so that it may receive the sun at all 
times," was the claim of its designer. It, too, 
has been brought back to the state in which it 
was originally conceived and shorn of its encum- 
bering outhouses and odds and ends which 
served their purposes well enough when it was 
a barracks or a prison, but which were a desecra- 
tion to anything called by so dignified a name 
as a chateau or a palace. This courtyard is to-day 
as it was when the lords and ladies in the train of 
Charles IX strolled and even gambolled therein. 

The Chapelle de Saint Louis (1240) is in every 
way remarkable, especially with respect to its 
great rose-window, which was found by Millet 
to have been walled up by Louis XIV. 

The military museum of to-day, which is en- 
closed by the palace walls, possesses a remark- 
able collection of its kind, but has no intimate 
lien upon the history of the palace, 



292 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

The parterre before the palace is cut off from 
the forest of Saint Germain by three ornate 
iron gates. It was relaid, a transformation from 
designs originally conceived in 1676, by Le 
Notre, modified in 1750 and much reduced in 
size and beauty in the nineteenth century, though 
later enlarged by taking three hectares of ground 
from the forest and turning them into the ac- 
cepted form of an English garden. 

A peninsula of a superficial area of over ten 
thousand acres snugly enfolded in one of the 
great horseshoe bends of the Seine contains 
the Foret de Saint Germain. A line drawn 
across the neck of the peninsula from Saint Ger- 
main to Poissy, following the Route de Poissy, 
completely cuts off this tongue of land which 
is as wild and wooded to-day as in the times of 
Francis, the Henris and the Louis. 

The routes and allees of the forest are traced 
with regularity and precision, and historians 
have written them down as of a length of nearly 
four hundred leagues, a statement which a glance 
at any map of the forest will well substantiate. 

High upon its plateau sits this historic wild- 
wood, for the most part of a soil dry and sandy, 
with here and there some great mamelon (Druidi- 
cal or Pagan, as the case may be) rising some- 
what above the average leveL Francis I, hunts- 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 293 

man and lover of art and nature, did much to 
preserve this great forest, and Louis XIV in his 
time developed its system of roads and paths, 
'^ chiefly to make hunting easy," says history, 
though it is difficult to follow this. At all events 
the forest remains to-day the most extensive 
unspoiled breathing-spot of its class near Paris. 

Within this maze of paths and alleys are many 
famed historic spots, the Chene Saint Fiacre, 
the Croix de Noailles, the Croix Saint Simon, 
the Croix du Main (erected in 1709 in honour 
of the son of Louis XIV), the Etoile des Amazones, 
the Patte d'Oie, the Chene du Capitaine and 
many more which are continually referred to 
in the history of the palace, the forest of Saint 
Germain-en-Laye, and of the Abbaye de Poissy. 

The forest is not wholly separated from the 
mundane world for occasionally a faint echo 
of the Rouen railway is heard, a toot from a 
river tug-boat bringing coal up-river to Paris, 
the strident notes of automobile horns, or that 
of a hooting steam-tram which scorches along 
the principal roadway over which state coaches 
of kings and courtiers formerly rolled. The 
contrast is not particularly offensive, but the 
railway threatens to make further inroads, so 
one hardly knows the future that may be in 
store for the partriarch oaks and elms and chest- 



294 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

nuts which make up this secular wildwood. 
Their ages may not in all cases approach those 
of the great Fontainebleau trees, and in point 
of fact the forest is by no means as solitary, nor 
ever was. One of the most celebrated, cer- 
tainly one of the most spectacular, duels of history 
took place in the park at Saint Germain-en- 
Laye. 

Gui Chabot de Jarnac lived a prodigal and 
profligate life at the expense — it was said — 
of the favours of the Duchesse d'Etampes. The 
dauphin, Henri, making an accusation, deemed 
wholly uncalled for, a ^^duel judiciaire^^ took 
place, with La Chataigneraie as the dauphin's 
substitute as adversary of de Jarnac who sought 
no apology but combat. 

It was because Henri meantime had become 
king and issued his first Letters Patent to his 
council concerning the ^^duel judiciaire,^^ where- 
by he absolved himself of the right to partake, 
that he appointed his dear friend Francois de 
Vivonne, "Seigneur de la Chataigneraie," to play 
the role for him. 

Unfortunately the young man could not justify 
by victory the honour of his king and before the 
monarch and the assembled court he was laid 
low by his adversary. 

This was one of the last of the ^^ duels judici- 



Saint Germain-en-Laye 295 

aires ^^ in France. What Saint Louis and Philippe- 
le-Bel had vainly sought to suppress, the pro- 
cedure having cost at least a hundred thousand 
livres, was practically accomplished by Henri II 
by a stroke of the pen. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

MAINTENON 

Out from Paris, on the old Route d'Espagne, 
running from the capital to the frontier, down 
which rolled the royal corteges of old, lie Main- 
tenon and its famous chateau, some sixty odd 
kilometres from Paris and twenty from Ram- 
bouillet. 

Just beyond Versailles, on the road to Main- 
tenon, lies the trim little townlet of Saint Cyr, 
known to-day as the West Point of France, the 
military school founded by Napoleon I giving 
it its chief distinction. 

Going back into the remote past one learns 
tliat the village grew up from a foundation of 
Louis XIV, who bought for ninety-one thousand 
livres "a chateau and a convent for women," 
that Madame de Maintenon might establish 
a girls' school therein. She reserved an apart- 
ment for herself, and one suspects indeed that 
it was simply another project of the Widow Scar- 
ron to have a place of rendezvous near the 
capital. Certainly under the circumstances, tak- 

296 



Maintenon 



297 



ing into consideration the good that she was 
doing for orphaned girls, she might at least have 
been allowed the 
right of a roof to 
shelter her when 
she wished. She 
was absolutely dom- 
inant within, though 
never actually in 
residence for any 
length of time. It 
was here that "Es- 
ther '' and "Athalie, " 
which Racine had 
composed expressly 
for Madame de 
Maintenon's pensionnaires, were produced for 
the first time. 

When not actually living at Saint C)t it was 
Madame de Maintenon's custom to come hither 
from Paris each day, arriving between seven 
and eight in the morning, passing the day and 
returning to town for the evening, much as a 
celebrated American millionaire journalist, whose 
country-house overlooks the famous convent gar- 
den, does to-day. 

Madame de Maintenon actually went into 
retirement at Saint Cyr upon the death of Louis 




298 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

XIV, and for four years, until her death, never 
left it. She died from old age, rather than from 
any grave malady, in this "Maison d'Education, " 
which she had inaugurated, and was buried in the 
chapel, beneath an elaborate tomb which the Due 
de Noailles, who married her niece, caused to be 
erected. The tomb was destroyed during the 
Revolution and the " Maison Royale de Saint Cyr, " 
of which nothing had been changed since its 
foundation, was suppressed, the edifice itself being 
pillaged and the remains of Madame de Maintenon 
sadly profaned, finally to be recovered and de- 
posited again in the chapel where a simple black 
marble slab marks them in these graven words : 

Cy-Git Madame De Maintenon 
1635-1719-1836 

Napoleon I established the Ecole Militaire 
at Saint Cyr, from which are graduated each 
year more than four hundred subaltern officers. 

The ancient gardens of Madame de Main- 
tenon's time now form the ^Xhamps de Mars," 
or drill ground, of the military school. 

South from Saint Cyr runs the "great inter- 
national highroad, the old Route Royale of the 
monarchy. It rises and falls, but mostly straight 
as the flight of the crow, until it crosses the great 
National Forest of Rambouillet. Following the 



Maintenon 299 



valley of the Eure almost to its headwaters it 
finally comes to Maintenon, a town of a couple 
of thousand souls, whose most illustrious in- 
habitant was that granddaughter of Theodore- 
Agrippa d'Aubigne, named Fran^ioise, and who 
came in time to be the Marquise de Maintenon. 

The Chateau de Maintenon was royal in all 
but name. The Tresorier des Finances under 
Louis XI, Jean Cottereau (a public ofhcial who 
made good it seems, since he also served in the 
same capacity for Charles VIII, Louis XII, and 
Francis I), had a single daughter, Isabeau, who, 
in 1526, married Jacques d'Angennes, who at 
the time was already Seigneur de Rambouillet. 

As a dot this daughter acquired the lands of 
Maintenon. The property was afterwards sold 
to the Marquis de Villeray, from whom Louis 
XIV bought it in 1674 and disposed of it as a 
royal gift to Fran^oise d'Aubigne, the fascinator 
of kings, who was afterwards to become (in 
1688) Madame La Marquise de Maintenon. 

This ambitious woman subsequently married 
her niece to the Due d'Ayen, son of the Marechal 
de Noailles, and as a marriage portion — or 
possibly to avoid unpleasant consequences — 
turned over the property of Maintenon to the 
young bride and her husband to whose family, 
the Noailles, it has ever since belonged. 



300 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

To-day the Due and Duchesse de Noailles 
make lengthy stays in this dehghtful seigneurial 
dwelling, and since the apartments are full to 
overflowing of historical souvenirs of their family 
it may be truly said that their twentieth century 
life is to some considerable extent in accord with 
the traditions of other days. 

The existence of this princely residence is an 
agreeable reminder of the life of luxury of the 
olden time albeit certain modernities which we 
to-day think necessities are lacking. 

Maintenon is certainly one of the most beauti- 
ful so-called royal chateaux of France, if not by 
its actual importance at least by many of the 
attributes of its architecture, the extent of the 
domain and the history connected therewith. 
It bridges the span between the private chateau 
and those which may properly be called royal. 

In the moyen-age Maintenon was a verita- 
ble chateau-fort, forming a quadrilateral edifice 
flanked by round towers at three of its angles, 
and at the fourth by a great square mass of a 
donjon, all of which was united by a vast ex- 
panse of solidly built wall which possessed all 
the classic attributes of the best military archi- 
tecture of its time. Entrance was only over a 
deep moat spanned by a drawbridge. 

Jean Cottereau made his acquisition of the 




Chateau de Maintenon 



Maintenon 30i 



domain towards 1490 and immediately planned 
a new scheme of being for the old fortress which, 
according to a more esthetic conception, would 
thus be brought into the class of a luxurious 
residential chateau. He destroyed the courtines 
which attached the great donjon to the rest 
of the building, and opened up the courtyard 
so that it faced directly upon the park. He 
ornamented sumptuously the window framings, 
the dormer windows, and the turrets, and framed 
in the entrance portal with a series of sculptured 
motives which he also added to the entrance 
to the great inner stairway. In short it was 
an enlargement and embellishment that was 
undertaken, but so thoroughly was it done that 
the edifice quite lost its original character in the 
process. Like all the chateaux built at this 
epoch Maintenon was no longer a mere fortress, 
but a palatial retreat, luxurious in all its ap- 
pointments, and shorn of all the manifest militant 
attributes which it had formerly possessed. 

The shell was there, following closely the 
original outlines, but the added ornamentation 
had effectually disguised its primordial existence. 
Living rooms needed light and air, while a for- 
tress or quarters for troops might well be ordained 
on other lines. The Renaissance livened up 
considerably the severe lines of the Gothic cha- 



302 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

teaux of France, and though invariably the marks 
of the transition are visible to the expert eye it 
is also true, as in the case of Maintenon, that 
there is frequently a homogeneousness which 
is sufficiently pleasing to effectually cover up any 
discrepancies which might otherwise be apparent. 
The warrior aspect is invariably lost in the transi- 
tion, and thus a Renaissance residential chateau 
enters at once into a different class from that of 
the feudal fortress regardless of the fact that 
such may have been its original status. 

The armorial device of Jean Cottereau — 
three unlovely lizards blazoned on a field of 
silver — is still to be seen sculptured on the two 
towers flanking the entrance portal which to- 
day lacks its old drawbridge before mentioned. 
Surrounding the edifice is a deep, unhealthful, 
mosquito-breeding moat which is all a mediaeval 
moat should be, but which is actually no great 
attribute to the place considering its disadvan- 
tages. One wonders that it is allowed to exist 
in so stagnant a condition, as the running waters 
of the near-by Eure might readily be made use 
of to change all this. The site of the chateau 
at the confluence of the Eure and the Voise is 
altogether charming. 

Madame de Maintenon did much to make 
the property more commodious and convenient 



Maintenon 303 



and built the great right wing which binds the 
donjon to the main corps de logis. Her own 
apartments were situated in the new part of the 
palace. She also built the gallery which leads 
from the Tour de Machicoulis to the pointed 
chapel, which was a construction of the time 
of Cottereau, an accessory which every self- 
respecting country-house of the time was bound 
to have. It was by this gallery that the open 
tribune in the little chapel was reached, thus 
enabling Louis XIV to pass readily to mass 
while he was so frequent a visitor at that period 
when, at Maintenon, he was overseeing the con- 
struction of his famous aqueduct. 

Maintenon has had the honour, too, to count 
among its illustrious guests Racine, who came 
at the request of Madame de Maintenon, and 
here wrote ^^ Esther" and ^^Athalie" which were 
later produced at Saint Cyr by Madame de Main- 
tenon's celebrated band of '^Demoiselles." 

Louis XIV was not the last of royal race to 
accept the Chateau de Maintenon^s hospitality 
for the unhappy Charles X was obliged to ask 
shelter of its chatelain for himself and fleeing 
family. They arrived a little after midnight 
of a hot August night, slept as well as possible 
in the former apartments of Madame de Main- 
tenon, and attended mass in the chapel on the fol- 



304 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

lowing morning. The monarch then discharged 
the royal guard and the "hundred Swiss" and 
gave up, defeated at the game of playing monarch 
against the will of the people. 

One enters the Cour d^Honneur by a great 
portal of the time of Louis XIV. Immediately 
before one is the principal facade, with its towers 
of brick and its slender little turrets framing 
in so admirably the entrance door. This facade 
is of the fifteenth century and on the tympan 
of the dormer windows one may still see the 
monogram of its builder, Cottereau. The draw- 
bridge has been made way with, and the turrets 
over the portal have been bound together by a 
diminutive balcony of stone, which, while a mani- 
fest superfluity, is in no way objectionable. 

Under the entrance vault are doors on either 
side giving access to the living apartments of 
the rez-de-chaussee. In the inner courtyard is 
to be found the most exquisite architectural 
detail of the whole fabric, the tower which en- 
closes the monumental stairway, to which entrance 
is had by a portal which is a veritable Gothic 
jewel. In the tympan of this portal, as in the 
dormer windows, is the device of Jean Cottereau, 
except in this case it is much more elaborate 
— a Saint Michel and the dragon, surrounded 
by a *^ semis de coquilles^^ bearing the escutcheons 



Maintenon 305 



of the chatelain — d' argent a lezards de sable. 

At the left of this stairway tower is the principal 
courtyard facade, supported by four arcades, 
pierced with great windows and surmounted by 
two fine dormer windows, all in the style of 
Louis XII, of which the same effects to be ob- 
served at Blois and in the Hotel d'Alluye are 
contemporary. 

At the left of the inner court is the wing built 
by Cottereau which terminates in a great round 
tower, while to the right is that erected by Madame 
de Maintenon ending at the donjon. Directly 
opposite is a magnificent vista over the canal 
of ornamental water framed on either side by 
patriarchal trees and having as a background 
the silhouette of the arches of the famous aque- 
duct which was to lead the waters of the Eure to 
Versailles. 

The interior of the chateau is not less remark- 
able than the exterior. Entering by the tower 
portal one comes at once to that magnificent 
grand escalier which is accounted one of the 
wonders of the French Renaissance. 

The Salle a Manger of to-day was the old- 
time Salle des Gardes. It is garnished with a 
fine wainscoting and panels of Cordovan leather. 
The Chambre a Coucher of Louis XIV, to the 
left, is to-day the Salon, and here are to be seen 



306 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

portraits of Louis XIV, Louis XII, Francis I, 
Henri IV, and Louis XIII. 

A tiny rotunda contains a statue of Henri IV 
as a child, and portraits of Madame de Maintenon 
and Louis XIV in their youth. A portrait 
gallery of restrained proportions contains effigies 
of Madame de Maintenon and her niece Mademoi- 
selle d'Aubigne, the Due de Penthievre, the 
Comtesse de Toulouse, the Due de Noailles, 
the Duchesse de Villars and the Duchesse de 
Chaumont. 

The show-piece of the chateau, albeit of recent 
construction, is known variously as the "Grand 
Galerie" and the "Longue Galerie. '' Its decora- 
tions are due to the Due de Noailles, the father 
of the present proprietor. Virtually it is a por- 
trait gallery of the Noailles family, going back 
to the times of the Crusaders and coming down 
to the twentieth century. 

The apartments of Madame de Maintenon 
form that portion of the chateau which has the 
chief sentimental interest. In an ante-chamber 
is a chaise a porteurs once having belonged to 
the Marquise, and her portrait by Mignard. 
Cordovan leather is hung upon the walls, and 
the restored sleeping-room is hung with a canopy 
and separated from the rest of the apartment 
by a balustrade in bois dore. Above the chimney- 




Aqueduct of Louis XIV at Maintenon 



306 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

portraits of Louis XIV, Louis XIT, Francis I, 
Henri IV, and Louis XIII. 

A tiny rotunda contains a statue of Henri IV 
as a child, and portraits of Madame de Maintenon 
and Louis XIV in their youth. A . portrait 
gallery of restrained proportions contains effigies 
of Madame de Maintenon and her niece Mademoi- 
selle d'Aubigne, the Due de Penthievre, the 
Comtesse de Toulouse, the Due de Noailles, 
the Duchesse de Villars and the Duchesse de 
Chaumont. 

The show-piece of the chateau, albeit of recent 
construction, is known variously as the "Grand 



Galerie ' ' and the ' Lonsue; GaJene. ' \ Its .decora- 
tions are due to tne Due de IS'oaines, me father 



of the present proprietor. Virtually it is a por- 
trait gallery of the Noailles family, going back 
to the times of the Crusaders and coming down 
to the twentieth century. 

The apartments of Madame de Maintenon 
form that portion of the chateau which has the 
chief sentimental interest. In an ante-chamber 
is a chaise a porteurs once having l)elonged to 
the Marquise, and her portrait by Mignard. 
Cordovan leather is hung upon the walls, and 
the restored sleeping-room is hung with a canopy 
and separated from the rest of the apartment 
by a balustrade in bois dore. Above the chimney- 



Maintenon 307 



piece is a portrait of Louis XIV, after Rigaud, 
and, finally, the oratory is ornamented by a 
series of elegant sculptures in wood and a magnif- 
icent Boule coffer. 

In the left wing is found a beautiful chapel 
of the fifteenth century, which is very pure in 
style. It is decorated with a series of Renaissance 
wood panels of the finest workmanship. The 
coloured glass of the windows is of the sixteenth 
century. 

The rebuilt monumental stairway connects 
directly with a passage leading to the entrance 
portico which opens on the garden terrace before 
the parterre. 

The park of Maintenon is in every way ad- 
mirable, with its pelouse, its great border of trees, 
its waterways and more than thirty bridges. 
Jean Cottereau himself planned the first vege- 
table and fruit garden, or potager, the same whose 
successor is the delight of the dwellers at Main- 
tenon to-day. 

The parterre^ the Grand Canal and the two 
avenues of majestic trees were due to the concep- 
tion of Le Notre, and their effect, as set off by 
the alleyed forest background and the pillars 
of the aqueduct of Louis XIV, is something 
unique. 

The gardens at Maintenon were perhaps not 



308 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Le Notre's most famous work but they followed 
the best traditions of their time, and because 
of their vast expanse of ornamental water were, 
in a way, quite unequalled. 

Ambling off towards the forest is a great avenue 
flanked with high overhanging shade trees known 
as the Allee Racine. It gets its name from the 
fact that the dramatist was wont to take his walks 
abroad in this direction and woo the muse 
while he was a guest of Madame de Maintenon. 



CHAPTER XIX 



RAMBOUILLET AND ITS FOREST 




Rambouillet is one of the most famous of 
the minor royal chateaux of France. Built under 
the first of the monarchies, in the midst of the vast 
forest of Yveline, it has always formed a part 

309 



310 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

of the national domain. Even now, under Re- 
publican France, it is still the scene of the hunts 
organized for visiting monarchs, and, within the 
last half dozen years alone, the monarchs of Spain 
and Belgium, Italy and England have shot hares 
and stags and pheasants in company with a Re- 
publican president. 

The occasions have lacked the picturesque 
costumes of the disciples of Saint Hubert in other 
times; but the huntsman still winds his horn to 
the same traditional tune and the banquets given 
in the chateau on such occasions are, in no small 
measure, an echo of what has gone before. 

It was in the old chateau of Rambouillet that 
Francis I died. In the month of March, 1547, 
Francis, coming from Chambord in the south, 
crossed the "accursed bridge" and arrived at 
the foot of the ivy-grown donjon which one sees 
to-day, the last remaining relic of the mediaeval 
fortress. For a year the monarch had led a 
wandering life, revisiting all the favourite haunts 
of his kingdom, and, though scarce turned fifty, 
was prematurely aged and gray. 

He was lifted tenderly from his royal coach, and 
by the winding stair, carried slowly to his apart- 
ments on the second floor, overlooking the three 
canals and the "accursed bridge" and the tangled 
forest beyond. 



Rambouillet and its Forest 31 1 



Jacques d'Angennes, to whose ancestors Ram- 
bouillet one day belonged, acted as host to his 
royal master and cared for him as a brother, but 
Francis was dispirited, and growing weaker every 
moment. He complained bitterly of the death 
of his favourite son from the plague, and of that 
of the gay monarch across the channel, his old 
friend, Henry VIII of England. 

He was restless and wished to move on to Saint 
Germain, but his condition made that impos- 
sible. After a feeble attempt to rouse himself 
for a hunt in the forest, he took to his bed again, 
with the admonition to his friend d'Angennes, 
who never left him: ''I am dying, send for my 
son, Henri." 

The prince joined the mourners around the 
royal bedside and heard his father's confession 
thus: "My son, I have sinned greatly; I have 
been led away by my passions; follow that which 
I have done that is accredited good, and ignore 
the evil; above all, cherish France; be good to 
my people." 

That was all except the final counsel to "be- 
ware of the Guises; they are traitors." After 
that he spoke no more. Francis I, the gallant, 
art-loving monarch, the father of the Renaissance 
in France, was dead. 

In 1562, Catherine de Medici, accompanied 



312 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

by her son Charles IX, here awaited the results 
of the momentous battle of Dreux. In 1588, 
Henri III, fleeing Paris after the ^^journee des 
barricades^ ^ came here to rest, and so fatigued 
was he on his arrival that he went to bed '^tout 
hotte:' 

The son of Louis XIV and Madame de Montes- 
pan came into possession of ''the palace and 
lands" and in his honour the property was made, 
in spite of its limited area, a Duche-Pairie. 

Louis XIV and Madame de Maintenon, as 
was but natural, because of its proximity to Main- 
tenon and to Paris, frequently honoured Ram- 
bouillet with their presence; and, a little later, 
Louis XV and the beautiful Comtesse de Toulouse 
followed suit. 

The Due de Penthievre, to whom the property 
had by this time descended, at the instance of 
Louis XVI, ceded to that monarch the domain 
of Rambouillet. 

Louis XVI built vast commons and outbuild- 
ings, all with some architectural pretence, to 
house the appanage of the royal hunt, and also 
built the Laiterie de la Reine and the model farm 
where, in 1786, he established the first national 
sheepfold. 

To-day this is the famous Ecole de Bergers, where 
is quartered the largest flock of moutons a laine 




Laiterie de la Reine, RaruhouUlet 



Rambouillet and its Forest 313 



(merino sheep) in France, they having been 
brought chiefly from Spain. 

The Laiterie de la Reine was a tiny sandstone 
temple with interior fittings chiefly of white 
marble, and with a great, round centre-table, and 
smaller tables in each corner, equally of marble, 
as becomes a hygienically fitted dairy. It was 
restored by Louis Napoleon during the Second 
Empire, and is stiU to be seen in all its pristine 
glory. 

In addition, Louis XVI had at Rambouiflet a 
private domain of a considerable extent which 
only the Constitution of 1791 united to the Civil 
List. This property, except the palace, the park 
and the forest, was sold later by the State. The 
Imperial Civil List, formed in 1805 by Napoleon, 
included these dependencies specifically, and the 
emperor frequently hunted in the neighbouring 
forest, though, compared to his predecessors, 
he had little time to devote to that form of sport. 
Here, too, was signed, in 1810, the decree which 
united Holland with the Empire. 

Rambouillet has fallen sadly since the Revolu- 
tion. A decree of the Representants du Peuple^ 
of October 14, 1793, provided that '^the furnish- 
ings of this palace, heretofore royal, shall be sold." 
Under the Consulate and Empire a certain citizen, 
Trepsat by name, received an injury in protect- 



314 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

ing Napoleon in an attack and, as recompense, 
was made the official Architect and Conservator 
of the Palace of Rambouillet. 

Hardly had Trepsat entered upon his functions 
when he suggested the demolition of the chateau. 
Napolean hesitated, but finally partially agreed, 
insisting, however, that enough should be left 
to form a comfortable hunting-lodge. Trepsat 
would have torn down all and rebuilt anew. 
Napoleon made an appointment with his archi- 
tect to visit the property and discuss the matter 
in detail the following year (1805), but at that 
moment he was campaigning in Austria, so the 
interview was not held. This was Trepsat's 
chance, and he found a pretext to overthrow the 
entire east wing, but was stopped before he was 
able to further carry out his ignorant act of 
vandalism. Trepsat was severely reprimanded 
by the emperor himself, and was ordered to put 
things back as he found them. "Even the most 
battered and sickly architect who ever lived 
could hardly have had a worse inspiration,'' said 
Napoleon. Trepsat, be it recalled, had lost a 
leg. 

The restoration was commenced, but Trepsat, 
committing one fault after another, and finally 
juggling with the accounts, was obliged to take 
on a collaborator by the name of Famin, a young 



Rambouillet and its Forest 315 

pensionnaire of the Academie des Beaux Arts, 
recently returned from Rome. It was he who 
saved Rambouillet from utter destruction. 

The apartments of Napoleon, which were those 
given over to public functions in the time of the 
Comte de Toulouse, had been, and were, most 
luxuriously appointed. That which shows most 
clearly the imprint of the imperial regime is the 
curious Salle de Bains which was in direct com- 
munication with the study, or Cabinet de Travail. 

It might have been a room in a Pompeian 
house so classic wxre its lines and decorations. 
There was a series of medallions painted on the 
wall representing portraits of members of the 
imperial family. These were chiefly portraits 
of the female sex, and Napoleon, the first time 
he entered his bath, in an excess of modesty and 
fury cried out: '^Who is the ass that did this 
thing?" Immediately they were painted out, 
and, for the sum of nine hundred and fifty francs, 
another artist was found who filled the frames 
of the medallions with sights and scenes asso- 
ciated less intimately with Napoleonic history. 

Under the Empire the architect Famin was 
commissioned to furnish a series of architectural 
embellishments to the gardens of Rambouillet. 
Various stone statues were added and an octagon 
pavilion on the He des Roches was restored and 



316 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

redecorated. Two great avenues were cut through 
the parterre^ and, as if fearing indiscretions on 
the part of his entourage, the emperor caused 
to be planted long rows of lindens and tulip 
trees, which were again masked by two rows of 
poplars. The peloux of the Jardin Fran^ais 
were reestablished and the curves and sweeps 
of the paths of the Jardin Anglais laid out anew. 

This ancient government property, arisen anew 
from its ruins, now bore the name of the Pavilion 
du Roi de Rome, after the son of Napoleon. 
The Ecuries, or stables, which had been built 
by Louis XVI, were transformed into kennels, 
and various "posts," or miniature shooting- 
boxes, were distributed here and there through 
the park. 

Under the Restoration the transformation of 
the chateau, which had been projected ever since 
the time of Louis XVI, undertaken and then 
abandoned by Napoleon, was again commenced, 
but on a less ambitious scale than formerly. 
Chiefly this transformation consisted of opening 
up windows, thus making practically a new 
facade. It was not wholly a happy thought, 
and the spirit of economy of Louis XVIII, no 
less, perhaps, than other motives, arrested this 
mutilation and the architect was discharged 
from his functions. 



i 




^^ 






■"'^'^'»#4%... 



Chateau de Rambonillet 



Rambouillet and its Forest 317 



Again the hand of fate fell hard upon Ram- 
bouillet and its definite eclipse as a royal abode 
came with the abdication of Charles X. The 
abdication was actually signed at Rambouillet, 
and here, in the same Salle du Conseil, the dau- 
phin renounced the throne in favour of the young 
Due de Bordeaux. 

It was at Rambouillet that Charles X passed 
those solemn last days before the abdication. 
He had been unmercifully harassed at Paris and 
sought a quiet retreat, '^not too far from the 
Tuileries," where he might repose a moment 
and take counsel. In view of later events this 
was significant; perhaps it was significant at the 
time, for the king speedily repented his abdica- 
tion. It was too late, for he had classed as rebels 
all the royalists who would have accepted the 
^^ infant king" as their monarch, even though 
the following Revolution prevented this. 

It was on the third of August that the commission- 
ers, deputies of the Provisionary Government, were 
brought before the king at Rambouillet. They an- 
nounced that twenty-five thousand armed Parisians 
were marching on the chateau to compel him to quit 
his kingdom. It was not a matter for debate, and at 
nine o'clock on the same night the monarch gave as- 
sent to being conducted to Cherbourg, where he em- 
barked upon his fatal exile. 



318 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

After 1830, with a business-like instinct, the 
authorities rented the property for twelve years 
to the Baron Schickler, and, at the end of the 
Revolution of 1848, its career became more 
plebeian still; it was rented to a man who converted 
the palace into an elaborately appointed road- 
house, and the lawns and groves into open-air 
restaurants and dancing places. 

Under the Gouvernement du Juillet the cha- 
teau, the park and the forest were removed from 
the Civil List, and entered upon the inventory 
of the Administration des Domaines. 

Under the Second Empire Rambouillet ap- 
peared again on the monarchial Civil List. Na- 
poleon III came here at times to hunt, but not 
to live, and of his rare appearances at the chateau 
but little record exists. Since 1870 Rambouillet 
has belonged to the Republican Government, 
and, since royalties no longer exist in France, 
Republican chiefs of state now take the lead in 
Rambouillet's national hunts. 

The property, as it stands to-day, is divided 
readily into four distinct parts, the palace, the 
parterre, the Jar din Anglais and the park. The 
grove of lindens is rem^arkable in every respect, 
the ornamental waters are gracious and of vast 
extent, and the Laiterie and the Ferme are de- 
cidedly models of their kind; but the Chau- 



Rambouillet and its Forest 3i9 



miere des Coquillages, a rustic summer-house 
of rocks and shells and questionable debris of 
all sorts, is hideous and unworthy. 

Not the least of the charming features of the 
park is the great alley of Louisiana cypresses, 
one of the real sights, indeed, perfecting the 
charm of the great body of water to the left of 
the chateau. 

Of the structure which existed in the four- 
teenth century, the chateau of Rambouillet re- 
tains to-day only a great battlemented tower, 
and some low-lying buildings attached to it. 
Successive enlargements, restorations and muti- 
lations have changed much of the original aspect 
of the edifice, and modern structures flank and 
half envelop that which, to all eyes, is manifestly 
ancient. The debris of the old fortress, which 
was the foundation of all, adds its bit to the con- 
glomerate mass of which the chief and most 
imposing elements are the two tall corps de logis 
in the centre. 

Within, a rather banal Salle de Bal is shown 
as the chief feature, but it is conventionally 
unlovely enough to be passed without emotion, 
save that its easterly portion takes in the cabinet^ 
or private apartment, where Charles X signed 
his abdication. Adjoining this is the bedroom 
occupied by that monarch, and a dining-room 



320 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

which also served His Majesty, and which is 
still used by the head of the government on 
ceremonious occasions. Its decorative scheme 
is of the period of Louis XV. 

The Salle de Conseil is of the period of Charles 
X, and has some fairly imposing carved wain- 
scotings showing in places the monograms of 
Marie Sophie and the Comtesse de Toulouse. 

A great map, or plan, of the Forest of Ram- 
bouillet covers the end wall, and, if not esthetically 
beautiful, is at least useful and very interesting. 

It was executed under Louis XVI and doubt- 
less served its purpose well when the hunters 
gathered after a day afield and recounted anec- 
dotes of their adventures. 

There is another apartment on the ground 
floor which is known as the Salle a Manger des 
Rendezvous de Chasse, whose very name ex- 
plains well its functions. 

The Cabinet de Travail of Marie Antoinette 
and the Salle de Bain of Napoleon have some- 
thing more than a mere sentimental interest; 
they were decidedly practical adjuncts to the 
royal palace. 

Napoleon's bath took the form of a rather 
short, deep pool. Its fresco decorations, as seen 
to-day — replacing that family portrait gallery 
which Napoleon caused to be painted out — 



Rambouillet and its Forest 321 



are after the pseudo-antique manner and repre- 
sent bird's-eye views of various French cities and 
towns, while a series of painted armorial trophies 
decorates the ceiling. 

On the second floor are the apartments occupied 
by the Duchesse de Berry and those of the 
Duchesse d'Angouleme. 

In the great round tower is the circular apart- 
ment where Francis I breathed his last. It is this 
great truss-vaulted room that most interests 
the visitor to Rambouillet. 

On the ground floor is another Salle de Bain, 
quite as theatrically disposed as that of Na- 
poleon. Its construction was due to the Comte 
de Toulouse whose taste ran to Delft tiles and 
polychrome panels, framing two imposing marines, 
also worked out in tiles. 

The parterre^ extending before the main build- 
ing, is of an ampleness scarcely conceivable until 
once viewed. It is purely French in design and 
is of the epoch of the tenancy of the Comte de 
Toulouse. Before the admirably grouped lindens 
was a boathouse, and off in every direction ran 
alleys of acacias, while here and there tulip beds, 
rose gardens and hedges of rhododendrons flanked 
the very considerable ornamental waters. This 
body of water, in the form of a trapezoid, is di- 
vided by four grass-grown islets and separates 



322 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

the Jardin Anglais from the Jardin Fran5:ais. 
One of the islets is known as the He des Roches 
and contains the Grotte de Rabelais, so named 
in honour of the Cure of Meudon, when he was 
presented at Rambouillet by the Cardinal du 
Bellay. It was on this isle that were given those 
famous fetes in honour of the ^' beaux esprits^* 
who formed the assiduous cortege of Catherine 
de Vivonne, mythological, pagan and outre. 

The Jardin Anglais at Rambouillet is the final 
expression of the species in France. Designed 
under the Due de Penthievre, it was restored 
and considerably enlarged by Napoleon and, 
following the contours of an artificial rivulet, it 
fulfils the description that its name implies. 

More remote, and half hidden from the pre- 
cincts of the chateau, are the Chaumiere and 
the Ermitage and they recall the background of 
a Fragonard or a Watteau. It is all very ^^ stagy" 
— but, since it exists, can hardly be called unreal. 

The park proper, containing more than twelve 
hundred hectares, is one of the largest and most 
thickly wooded in France. Between the par- 
terre and the French and English garden and the 
park lie the Farm and the Laiterie de la Reine, 
the caprice of Louis XVI when he would content 
Marie Antoinette and give her something to think 
about besides her troubles. Napoleon stripped 



Rambouillet and its Forest 323 

it of its furnishings to install them, for a great part, 
at Malmaison, for that other unhappy woman — 
Josephine. Later, to give pleasure to Marie 
Louise, he ordered them brought back again to 
Rambouillet, but it was to Napoleon III that 
the restoration of this charming conceit was due. 

In the neighbourhood of Rambouillet was the 
famous Chateau de Chasse, or royal shooting- 
box, which Louis XV was fond of making a place 
of rendezvous. 

On the banks of the Etang de Pourras stood 
this Chateau de Saint Hubert, named for the 
patron saint of huntsmen, and within its walls 
was passed many a happy evening by king and 
courtiers after a busy day with stag and hound. 

The hunt in FraTice was perhaps at the most 
picturesque phase of its existence at this time. 
The hunt of to-day is but a pale, though bloody, 
imitation of the real sport of the days when mon- 
archs and their seigneurs in slashed doublet 
and hose and velvet cloaks pursued the deer of 
the forest to his death, and knew not the maitre 
d^equipage of to-day. 



CHAPTER XX 

• CHANTILLY 

Chantilly, because of its royal associations, 
properly finds its place in every traveller's French 
itinerary. Not only did Chantilly come to its 
great glory through royal favour, but in later 
years the French government has taken it under 
its wing, the chateau, the stables and the vast 
park and forest, until the ensemble is to-day 
as much of a national show place as Versailles 
or Saint Germain. It is here in the marble 
halls, where once dwelt the Condes and the 
Montmorencys, that are held each year the ex- 
aminations of the French Academie des Beaux 
Arts. And besides this it is a place of pilgrimage 
for thousands of tourists who, as a class, for a 
couple of generations previously, never got farther 
away from the capital than Saint Cloud. 

Many charters of the tenth century make 
mention of the estates of Chantilly, which at 
that time belonged to the Seigneurs of Senlis. 
The chateau was an evolution from a block - 
Jiouse, or fortress, erected by Catulus in Gallo- 

324 



Chantilly 



325 




326 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Roman times and four centuries later it remained 
practically of the same rank. In the fourteenth 
century the chateau was chiefly a vast fortress 
surrounded by a water defence in the form of 
an enlarged moat by means of which it was able 
to resist the Bourguignons and never actually 
fell until after the taking of Meaux by the English 
king, Henry V. 

Jean II de Montmorency, by his marriage 
with Marguerite d'Orgemont, came to be the 
possessor of the domain, their son, in turn, be- 
coming the heir. It was this son, Guillaume, 
who became one of the most brilliant servitors 
of the monarchs Louis XI, Louis XII, and Francis 
I, and it was through these friends at court that 
Chantilly first took on its regal aspect. 

In turn the celebrated Anne de Montmo- 
rency, Connetable de France, came into the 
succession and finding the old fortress, albeit 
somewhat enlarged and furbished up by his 
predecessor, less of a palatial residence than 
he would have, separated the ancient chateau- 
fort from an added structure by an ornamental 
moat, or canal, and laid out the pelouse, parterres 
and the alleys of greensward leading to the forest 
which make one of the great charms of Chantilly 
to-day. 

Here resided, as visitors to be sure, but for 




Statue of Le Notre, Chantilly 



Chantilly 327 

more or less extended periods, and at various 
times, Charles V, Charles IX and Henri IV, 
each of them guests of the hospitable and am- 
bitious Montmorencys. 

Chantilly passed in 1632 to Charlotte, the 
sister of the last Marechal de Montmorency, 
the wife of Henri II, Prince de Conde, the mother 
of the Grand Conde, the Prince de Conti and 
the Duchesse de Longueville. 

With the Grand Conde came the greatest 
fame, the apotheosis, of Chantilly. This noble 
was so enamoured of this admirable residence 
that he never left it from his thoughts and dec- 
orated it throughout in the most lavish taste 
of his time, destroying at this epoch the chateau 
of the moyen-age and the fortress. These were 
the days of gallant warriors with a taste for pretty 
things in art, not mere bloodthirsty slaughterers. 

On the foundations of the older structures 
there now rose an admirable pile (not that which 
one sees to-day, however), embellished by the 
surroundings which were evolved from the brain 
of the landscape gardener, Le Notre. The 
Revolution made way with this lavish structure 
and with the exception of the Chatelet, or the 
Petit Chateau (designed by Jean Bullant in 1560, 
and remodelled within by Mansart) the present- 
day work is a creation of the Due d'Aumale, 



328 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

the heir to the Condes' name and fame, to whom 
the National Assembly gave back his ancestral 
estates which had in the meantime come into 
the inventory of royal belongings through the 
claims established by the might of the Second 
Empire. 

Back to the days of the Grand Conde one 
reads of an extended visit made by Louis XIV 
to his principal courtier. It was at an expense 
of two hundred thousand ecus that the welcom- 
ing fete was accomplished. Madame de Sevigne 
has recounted the event more graphically than 
any other chronicler, and it would be presump- 
tion to review it here at length. The incident 
of Vatel alone has become classic. 

To the coterie of poets at Rambouillet must 
be added those of Chantilly; their sojourn here 
added much of moment to the careers and rep- 
utations of Boileau, Racine, Bourdaloue and 
Bossuet. It was the latter, who, in the funeral 
oration which he delivered on the death of the 
Prince de Conde, said: 

"Here under his own roof one saw the Grand 
Conde as if he were at the head of his armies, a 
noble always great, as well in action as in re- 
pose. Here you have seen him surrounded by 
his friends in this magnificent dwelling, in the 
shady alleys of the forest or beside the purling 



Chantilly 329 

waters of the brooks which are silent neither 
day nor night." 

The Grand Conde died, however, at Fontaine- 
bleau. The heir, Henri- Jules de Bourbon, did 
his share towards keeping up and embellishing 
the property, and to him was due that charming 
wildw^ood retreat known as the Pare de Sylvie. 

Louis-Henri de Bourbon, Minister of Louis XV 
at the commencement of his reign, had gained 
a fabulous sum of money in the notorious ^^Law^s 
Bank" affair, and, with a profligate and prod- 
igal taste in spending, lived a life of the grandest 
of grand seigneurs at Chantilly, to which, as his 
donation to its architectural importance, he 
contributed the famous Ecuries, or stables. To 
show that he was persona grata at court he gave 
a great fete here for Louis XV and the Duchesse 
du Barry. 

The last Prince de Conde but one before 
the Revolution built the Chateau d'Enghien in 
the neighbourhood, and sought to people the 
Pare de Sylvie with a rustic colony of thatched 
maisonettes and install his favourites therein in 
a weak imitation of what had been done in the 
Petit Trianon. The note was manifestly a false 
one and did not endure, not even is its echo 
plainly audible for all is hearsay to-day and no 
very definite record of the circumstance exists. 



330 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

Chantilly in later times has been a favourite 
abode with modern monarchs. The King of 
Denmark, the Emperor Joseph II and the King 
of Sweden were given hospitahty here, and much 
money was spent for their entertainment, and 
much red and green fire burned for their amuse- 
ment and that of their suites. 

The Revolution's fell blow carried off the 
principal parts of the Conde's admirable con- 
structions and it is fortunate that the Petit Cha- 
teau escaped the talons of the ''Bande Noire." 
Immediately afterwards the Chateau d'Enghien 
and the Ecuries were turned over to the uses of 
the Minister of War, and the authorities of the 
Jardin des Plantes were given permission to 
transplant and transport anything which pleased 
their fancy among the exotics which had been 
set out by Le Notre in Chantilly's famous par- 
terres. 

Under the imperial regime the Foret de Chan- 
tilly was given in fee simple to Queen Hortense, 
though all was ultimately returned to the Conde 
heirs after the Restoration. It was at this period 
that Chantilly received the visit of Alexander, 
Emperor of Russia, and the historian's account 
of that visit makes prominent the fact that dur- 
ing the periods of rain it was necessary that an 
umbrella be carried over the imperial head as 



Chantilly 331 

he passed through the corridors of the palace 
from one apartment to another. 

The host of the emperor died here in 1818 
and his son, spending perhaps half of his time 
here, cared little for restoration and spent all 
his waking hours hunting in the forest, returning 
to the Petit Chateau only to eat and sleep. 

The Due de Bourbon added to the flanking 
wings of the Petit Chateau and cleaned up the 
debris which was fast becoming moss-grown, 
weed encumbered and altogether disgraceful. 
The moats were cleaned out of, their miasmatic 
growth and certain of the grass-carpeted par- 
terres resown and given a semblance of their 
former selves. 

Some days after the Revolution of 1830 the 
Prince de Conde died in a most dramatic fashion, 
and his son, the Due d'Enghien, having been 
shot at Vincennes under the Empire, he willed 
the Due d'Aumale and his issue his legal de- 
scendants forever. 

Towards 1840 the Due d'Aumale sought to 
reconstruct the splendours of Chantilly, but a 
decree of January 22, 1852, banished the entire 
Orleans family and interrupted the work when 
the property was sold to the English bankers, 
Coutts and Company, for the good round sum 
of eleven million francs, not by any means an 



332 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

extravagant price for this estate of royal aspect 
and proportions. The National Assembly of 
1872 did the only thing it could do in justice to 
tradition — bought the property in and decreed 
that it be restored to its legitimate proprietor. 

It was as late as 1876 that the Due d'Aumale 
undertook the restoration of the Chatelet and 
the rebuilding of the new chateau which is seen 
to-day. The latter is from the designs of Henri 
Daumet, member of the Institut de France. 

In general the structure of to-day occupies 
the site of the moyen-age chateau but is of quite 
a different aspect. 

The Due d'Aumale made a present of the 
chateau and all that was contained therein to 
the Institut de France. From a purely sordid 
point of view it was a gift valued at something 
like thirty-five million francs, not so great as 
many new-world public legacies of to-day, but 
in certain respects of a great deal more artistic 
worth. 

The mass is manifestly imposing, made up as it 
is, of four distinct parts, the Eglise, dating from 
1692, the Ecuries, the Chatelet — or Petit Chateau, 
and the Chateau proper — the modern edifice. 

Before the celebrated Ecuries is a green, vel- 
vety pelouse which gives an admirable approach. 
The architecture of the Ecuries is of a heavy 



Chantilly 333 

order and the sculptured decorations actually 
of little esthetic worth, representing as they 
do hunting trophies and the like. Before the 
great fountain one deciphers a graven plaque 
which reads as follows: 

Louis Henri de Bourbon 

Prince de Conde 

Fut Construire Cette Ecurie 

1 701 — 1784. 

Within the two wings may be stabled nearly 
two hundred horses. The Grand Ecuries at 
Chantilly are assuredly one of the finest ex- 
amples extant of that luxuriant art of the eight- 
eenth century French builder. Luxurious, ex- 
cessively ornate and overpowering it is, and, for 
that reason, open to question. The work of the 
period knew not the discreet middle road. It was 
of Chantilly that it was said that the live stock was 
better lodged than its masters. The architect of 
this portion of the chateau was Jean Aubert, one 
of the collaborators of Jules Hardouin Mansart. 

The characteristics of Chantilly, take it as 
a whole, the chateau, the park and the forest, 
are chiefly theatrical, but with an all-abiding 
regard for the proprieties, for beyond a certain 
heaviness of architectural style in parts of the 
chateau everything is of the finely focussed rel- 



334 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

ative order of which the French architect and 
landscape gardener have for ages been past 
masters. 

The real French garden is here to be seen 
almost at its best, its squares and ovals of grassy- 
green apportioned off from the mass by gravelled 
walks and ornamented waters. The "tapis 
d'orienV^ effect, so frequently quoted by the 
French in v^Titing of such works, is hardly ex- 
celled elsewhere. 

All this shocked the mid-eighteenth century 
English traveller, but it was because he did not, 
perhaps could not, understand. Rigby, "the 
Norwich alderman'' as the French rather con- 
temptuously referred to this fine old English 
gentleman, said frankly of Chantilly: "All this 
has cost dear and produced a result far from 
pleasing." He would have been better pleased 
doubtless with a privet or box hedge and an 
imitation plaster rockery, things which have 
never agreed with French taste, but which were 
the rule in pretentious English gardens of the 
same period. Rigby must indeed have been a 
" grmcheaUj^^ as the French called him, for this 
same up-country gentleman said of Versailles: 
"Lovely surrounding country but palace and 
park badly designed." Versailles is not that, 
whatever else its faults may be. 



Chantilly 335 

Chantilly is more than a palace, it is a museum 
of nature, a hermitage of art and of history. 
The fantasy of its tourelles, its lucarnes and its 
pignons are something one may hardly see else- 
where in such profusion, and the fact that they 
are modern is forgotten in the impression of the 
general silhouette. 

The adventurer who first built a donjon on 
the Rocher de Chantilly little knew with what 
seigneurial splendour the site was ultimately 
to be graced. From a bare outpost it was trans- 
formed, as if by magic, into a Renaissance palace 
of a supreme beauty. The Due d'Aumale said 
in his '^Acte de Donation de Chantilly": ''It 
stands complete and varied, a monument of 
French art in all its branches, a history of the 
best epochs of our glory." 

Among all the palatial riches neighbouring 
upon Paris, not forgetting Versailles, Compiegne, 
Fontainebleau, Pierrefonds and Rambouillet, 
Chantilly, by the remarkable splendour of its 
surroundings, its situation and the artistic treas- 
ures which it possesses, is in a class by itself. 
It is a class more clearly defined by the historic 
souvenirs which surround it than any other 
contemporary structure of this part of France. 

Its corridors and gravelled walks and the long 
alleys of the park and forest may not take on 



336 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

the fete-like aspect which they knew in the eight- 
eenth century, but they are not sohtary Hke 
those of Fontainebleau and Rambouillet, nor 
noisily overrun like those of Versailles or Saint 
Germain. 

The ornamental waters which surround the 
Chateau de Chantilly are of a grand and nearly 
unique beauty. It is a question if they are not 
finer than the waters of Versailles, indeed they 
preceded them and may even have inspired 
them. 

The Chatelet, the chateau proper and the 
chapel form a group quite distinct from the 
Ecuries. The Cour d'Honneur is really splendid 
and one hardly realizes the juxtaposition of 
modernity. The pavilion attributed to Jean Bul- 
lant, the western facade, the ancient Petit Chateau, 
the Grand Vestibule, the Grand Escalier and the 
Gallerie des Cerfs and a dozen other apartments 
are of a rare and imposing beauty, though losing 
somewhat their distinctive aspect by reason of 
the objets de musee distributed about their walls 
and floors. 

One of the landscape gems of Chantilly is 
the Pelouse, a vast esplanade of greensward 
now forming, in part, the celebrated race track 
of Chantilly. Sport ever formed a part of the 
outdoor program at Chantilly, but that of to- 




Chateau de Chantilly 



Chantilly 337 

day is just a bit more horsey than that of old, 
a good deal less picturesque and assuredly more 
vulgarly banal as to its cachet than the hunts, 
the tourneys and courses of the romantic age. 

Thousands come to Chantilly to wager their 
coin on scrubs and dark horses ridden by third- 
rate ^^warned-ofT" jockeys from other lands, 
but probably not ten in ten thousand of the 
lookers on at the Grand Prix du Jockey Club 
in May ever make the occasion of the spring 
meeting an opportunity for visiting the fine old 
historic monument of the Condes. 

The ^^ Races" of Chantilly may be given a 
further word in that they are an outgrowth of 
a foundation by the Due d' Orleans in 1832. 
The track forms a circuit of two thousand metres, 
and occupies quite the best half of the Pelouse, 
closed in on one side by the thick-grown Foret 
de Chantilly and flanked, in part, on the other 
by the historic Ecuries, with the Tribune, or 
grand stand, just to the south. 

Many tourists arrive at Chantilly by auto, 
stop brusquely before the Grande Grille, rush 
through the galleries of the chateau, do ^^cent 
pas^^ in the park, give a cursory glance at the 
stables and are off; but more, many more, with 
slower steps and saner minds, drink in the charms 
which are offered on all sides and consider 



338 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

the time well spent even if they have paid "Boule- 
vard Prices" at the Restaurant du Grand Conde 
for their dejeuner. 

It has been said that a museum is a reunion 
of objets cfart brought about by a methodical 
grouping, either chronologically or categorically. 
The Due d'Aumale's Musee de Chantilly is 
more an expression of personal taste. He col- 
lected what he wished and he arranged his col- 
lections as suited his fancy. 

The famous Musee de Chantilly, which is 
the lodestone which draws most folk thither, 
so admirably housed, was a gift of the Due 
d'Aumale who, for the glory of his ancestors, 
and the admiration of the world, to say nothing 
of his own personal satisfaction, here gathered 
together an eclectic collection of curious and 
artistic treasures, certainly not the least interest- 
ing or valuable among the great public collec- 
tions in France. The effect produced is some- 
times startling, a Messonier is cheek by jowl 
with a Baron Gros, a Decamps vis a vis to a 
Veronese, and a Lancret is bolstered on either 
hand by a Poussin and a Nattier. Amid all 
this disorder there is, however, an undeniable, 
inexplicable charm. 

There are three distinct apartments worth, 
more than all the others, the glance of the hurried 



Chantilly 339 

visitor to the Musee Conde at Chantilly. In 
the first, the Santuario, is the Livre d'Heures 
of Etienne Chevalier, by Jean Fouquet, con- 
sidered as the most important relic of primitive 
French art extant. 

The Cabinet des Gemmes comes second, and 
here is the celebrated ^^Diamant Rose, '^ called 
the Grand Conde. 

Finally there is the Galerie de Psyche, with 
forty-four coloured glass windows, executed for 
the Connetable de Montmorency in 1 541 -1542. 

The great collection of historical and artistic 
treasures stowed away within the walls of Chan- 
tilly the Due d'Aumale selected himself in order 
to associate his own name with the glorious 
memory of the Condes, who were so intimately 
connected with the chateau. 

The Due sought to recover such of the former 
furnishings of the chateau as had been dissipated 
during the Revolution whenever they could be 
heard of and could be had at public or private 
sale. 

In this connection a word on Chantilly lace 
may not be found inapropos. The Chantilly 
lace of to-day, it is well to recall, is a mechanically 
produced article of commerce, turned out by 
the running mile from Nottingham, England, 
though in the days when Chantilly's porcelains 



340 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

rivalled those of Sevres it was purely a local 
product. One may well argue therefore that 
the bulk of the Chantilly lace sold in the shops 
of Chantilly to-day is not on a par with the ad- 
mirable examples to be seen in the glass cases 
of the museum. 

A wooded alley leading to the great park 
runs between the main edifice and the Chateau 
d'Enghien, a gentle incline descending again 
to the sunken gardens in a monumental stair- 
way of easy slope, the whole a quintessence of 
much that is best of the art of the landscape 
gardener of the time. 

To the left extends the vast Jardin Anglais 
— a veritable French Jardin Anglais. Let not 
one overlook the distinction: On conventional 
lines it is pretty, dainty and pleasing, but the 
species lacks the dignified formality of the Italian 
garden or the ingenious arrangement of the 
French. Its curves and ovals and circles are 
annoying after the lignes droites and the right 
angles and the hroderies of the French variety. 

The Foret de Chantilly covers two thousand 
four hundred and forty-nine hectares and ex- 
tends from the Bois de Herivaux on one side to 
the Foret de Senlis on the other. The rendez- 
vous-de-chasse was, in the old days, and is to-day 
on rare occasions, at the Rond Point, to which 



Chantilly 341 

a dozen magnificent forest roads lead from all 
directions, that from the town being paved with 
Belgian blocks, the dread of automobilists, but 
delightful to ride over in muddy weather. The 
Route de Connetable, so called, is well-nigh 
ideal of its kind. It launches forth opposite 
the chateau and at its entrance are two flanking 
stone lions. It is of a soft soil suitable for horse- 
back riding, but entirely unsuited for wheeled 
traffic of any kind. 

Another of the great forest roads leads to the 
Chateau de la Reine Blanche, a diminutive 
edifice in the pointed style, with a pair of svelte 
towers coiffed candle-snuffer fashion. Tradi- 
tion, and very ancient and somewhat dubious 
tradition, attributes the edifice as having be- 
longed to Blanche de Navarre, the wife of Philippe 
de Valois. Again it is thought to have been a 
sort of royal attachment to the Abbaye de Royau- 
mont, built near by, by Saint Louis. This quaintly 
charming manor of minute dimensions was a 
tangible, habitable abode in 1333, but for genera- 
tions after appears to have fallen into desuetude. 
A mill grew up on the site, and again the walls 
of a chateau obliterated the more mundane, 
work-a-day mill. The Due de Bourbon restored 
the whole place in 1826 that it might serve him 
and his noble friends as a hunting-lodge. 



CHAPTER XXI 
compi:6gne and its forest 

One of the most talked of and the least visited 
of the minor French palaces is that of Com- 
piegne. The archeologists coming to Compiegne 
first notice that all its churches are ^'malorien- 
teesy It is a minor point with most folk, but 
when one notes that its five churches have their 
high altars turned to all points of the compass, 
instead of to the east, it is assuredly a fact to be 
noticed, even if one is more romantically inclined 
than devout. 

Through and through, Compiegne, its palace, 
its hotel-de-ville, its forest, is delightful. Old 
and new huddle close together, and the art nouveau 
decorations of a branch of a great Parisian de- 
partment store flank a butcher's stall which looks 
as though it might have come down from the 
times when all trading was done in the open air. 

Compiegne's origin goes back to the antique. 
It was originally Compendium, a Roman station 
situated on the highway between Soissons and 
Beauvais. A square tower, Caesar's Tower, 

342 



Compiegne and Its Forest. 



343 



gave a military aspect to the walled and fortified 
station, and evidences are not wanting to-day 
to suggest with what strength its fortifications 
were endowed. 



€^^ 




1' ^^^^ ■ 



a' Honneur :SV>J^ V 



Place d'Apmes 



It was here that the first Frankish kings built 
their dwelling, and here that Pepin-le-Bref re- 
ceived the gracious gift of an organ from the 



344 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

Emperor Constantine, and here, in 8;^^, that an 
assembly of bishops and nobles deposed Louis- 
le-Debonnaire. 

Charles-le-Chauve received Pope Jean VIII 
in great pomp in the palace at Compiegne, and 
it was this Pope who gave absolution to Louis- 
le-Begue, who died here but a year after, 879. 
The last of the Carlovingians, Louis V (le-Faine- 
ant), died also at Compiegne in 987. 

The city is thus shown to have been a favourite 
place of sojourn for the kings of the Franks, 
and those of the first and second races. As 
was but obvious many churchly councils were 
held here, fourteen were recorded in five cen- 
turies, but none of great ecclesiastical or civil 
purport. 

The city first got its charter in 11 53, but the 
Merovingian city having fallen into a sort of gal- 
loping decay Saint Louis gave it to the Domini- 
cans in 1260, who here founded, by the orders 
of the king, a Hotel Dieu which, in part, is the 
same edifice which performs its original func- 
tions to-day. 

The first great love of Compiegne was ex- 
pressed by Charles V, who rebuilt the palace of 
Charles-le-Chauve in a manner which was far 
from making it a monumental or artistically 
disposed edifice. It was originally called the 



Compiegne and Its Forest 345 



Louvre, from the Latin word opis {Vxuvre)^ 
a word which was applied to all the chateaux- 
forts of these parts. The same monarch did 
better with the country-houses which he after- 
wards built at Saint Germain and Vincennes; 
perhaps by this time he had grown wise in his 
dealings with architects. 

Like all the little towns of the Valois, Com- 
piegne abounds in souvenirs of the Guerre de 
Cent Ans, Jeanne d'Arc, Louis XIV, Louis XV, 
Napoleon I and Napoleon III, and as its monu- 
ments attest this glory, so its forest, one of the 
finest in France, awakens almost as many his- 
torical memories. 

Wars and rumors of war kept Compiegne in 
a turmoil for centuries, but the most theatrical 
episode was the famous ^^ sortie^ ^ made by Jeanne 
d'Arc when she was attempting to defend the 
city against the combined English and Bur- 
gundian troops. It was an episode in which 
faint heart, perhaps treason, played an unwel- 
come part, for while the gallant maid was tak- 
ing all manner of chances outside the gates the 
military governor, Guillaume de Flavy, ordered 
the barriers of the great portal closed behind 
her and her men. 

Near the end of the Pont de Saint Louis Jeanne 
d'Arc fell into the hands of the besiegers. An 



346 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

archer from Picardy captured her single handed, 
and, for a round sum in silver or in kind, turned 
her over to her torturer, Jean de Luxembourg. 
A statue of the maid is found on the public *' Place, " 
and the Tour Jeanne d'Arc, a great circular 
donjon of the thirteenth century, is near by. 
Another souvenir is to be found in the ancient 
Hotel de Boeuf, at No. 9 Rue de Paris, where the 
maid lodged from the eighteenth to the twenty- 
third of August, 1429, awaiting the entry of 
Charles VII. 

With the era of Francis I that gallant and 
fastidious monarch came to take up his residence 
at Compiegne. He here received his "friend 
and enemy," Charles V, but strangely enough 
there is no monument in Compiegne to-day 
which is intimately associated with the stay 
here of the art-loving Francis. He preferred, 
after aU, his royal manor at Villers-Cotterets 
near by. There was more privacy there, and it 
formed an admirable retreat for such moments 
when the king did not wish to bask in publicity, 
and these moments were many, though one 
might not at first think so when reading of his 
affairs of state. There were also affairs of the 
heart which, to him, in many instances, were 
quite as important. This should not be for- 
gotten. 



Compiegne and Its Forest 347 



In 1624 a treaty was signed at Compiegne 
which assured the alliance of Louis XIII with 
the United Provinces, and during this reign the 
court was frequently in residence here. In 1631 
Marie de Medici, then a prisoner in the palace, 
made a notable escape and fled, doomed ever 
afterwards to a vagabond existence, a terrible 
fall for her once proud glory, to her death in a 
Cologne garret ten years later. 

In 1635 the Grand Chancellor of Sweden 
signed a treaty here which enabled France to 
mingle in the affairs of the Thirty Years' War. 

During the Fronde, that "Woman's War," 
which w^as so entirely unnecessary, Anne d'Aut- 
riche held her court in the Palace of Compiegne 
and received Christine de Suede on certain oc- 
casions when that royal lady's costume was of 
such a grotesque nature, and her speech so che- 
valeresque, that she caused even a scandal in a 
profligate court. Anne d'Autriche, too, left Com- 
piegne practically a prisoner; another menage 
a trots had been broken up. 

The most imposing event in the history of 
Compiegne of which the chronicles tell was the 
assembling of sixty thousand men beneath the 
walls by Louis XIV, in order to give Madame 
de Maintenon a realistic exhibition of "playing 
soldiers." At all events the demonstration was 



348 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

a bloodless one, and an immortal page in Saint- 
Simon's ^'Memoires" consecrates this gallantry 
of a king in a most subtle manner. 

Another fair lady, a royal favourite, too, came 
on the scene at Compiegne in 1769 when Madame 
du Barry was the principal artiste in the great 
fete given in her honour by Louis XV. She was 
lodged in a tiny chateau (built originally for 
Madame de Pompadour) a short way out of 
town on the Soissons road. 

Du Barry must have been a good fairy to Com- 
piegne for Louis XV lavished an abounding 
care on the chateau and, rather than allow the 
architect, Jacques Ange Gabriel, have the free 
hand that his counsellors advised, sought to 
have the ancient outlines of the former struc- 
ture on the site preserved and thus present 
to posterity through the newer work the two 
monumental facades which are to be seen to-day. 
The effort was not wholly successful, for the 
architect actually did carry out his fancy with 
respect to the decoration in the same manner 
in which he had designed the Ecole Militaire 
at Paris and the two colonnaded edifices facing 
upon the Place de la Concorde. 

This work was entirely achieved when Louis 
XVI took possession. This monarch, in 1780, 
caused to be fitted up a most elaborate apartment 



Compiegne and Its Forests 349 

for the queen (his marriage with Marie An- 
toinette was consecrated here), but that indeed 
was all the hand he had in the work of building 
at Compiegne, which has practically endured 
as his predecessor left it. The Revolution and 
Consulate used the chateau as their fancy willed, 
and rather harshly, but in 1806 its restoration 
was begun and Charles IV of Spain, upon his 
dethronement by Napoleon, was installed therein 
a couple of years later. 

The palace, the park and the forest now became 
a sort of royal appanage of this Spanish monarch, 
which Napoleon, in a generous spirit, could well 
afford to will him. He lived here some months 
and then left precipitately for Marseilles. 

Napoleon affected a certain regard for this 
palatial property, though only occupying it at 
odd moments. He embellished its surroundings, 
above all its gardens, in a most lavish manner. 
Virtually, all things considered, Compiegne is 
a Palais Napoleonien, and if one would study 
the style of the Empire at its best the thing may 
be done at Compiegne. 

On July 30, 1 814, Louis XVIII and Alexander 
of Russia met at Compiegne amid a throng of 
Paris notabilities who had come thither for the 
occasion. 

Charles X loved to hunt in the forest of Com- 



350 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

piegne. In 1832, one of the daughters of Louis- 
PhiHppe, the Princesse Louise, was married to 
the King of the Belgians in this palace. 

From 1852 to 1870 the palace and its grounds 
were the scenes of many imperial fetes. 

Napoleon III had for Compiegne a particular 
predilection. The prince-president, in 1852, in- 
stalled himself here for the autumn season, and 
among his guests was that exquisite blond beauty, 
Eugenie Montijo, who, the year after, was to 
become the empress of the French. Faithful 
to the memory of his uncle, by reason of a ro- 
mantic sentiment, the Third Napoleon came 
frequently to Compiegne; or perhaps it was be- 
cause of the near-by hunt, for he was a passionate 
disciple of Saint Hubert. It was his Versailles! 

The palace of Compiegne as seen to-day pre- 
sents all the classic coldness of construction of 
the reign of Louis XV. Its lines were severe and 
that the building was inspired by a genius is 
hard to believe, though in general it is undeniably 
impressive. Frankly, it is a mocking, decadent 
eighteenth century architecture that presents itself, 
but of such vast proportions that one sets it down 
as something grand if not actually of surpassing 
good taste. 

In general the architecture of the palace pre- 
sents at first glance a coherent unit, though in 



Compiegne and Its Forest 351 

reality it is of several epochs. Its furnishings 
within are of different styles and periods, not 
all of them of the best. Slender gold chairs, 
false reproductions of those of the time of Louis 
XV, and some deplorable tapestries huddle close 
upon elegant "bergeres^^ of Louis XVI, and sofas, 
tables and bronzes of master artists and crafts- 
men are mingled with cheap castings unworthy 
of a stage setting in a music hall. A process of 
adroit eviction will some day be necessary to 
bring these furnishings up to a consistent plane 
of excellence. 

One of the facades is nearly six hundred feet 
in length, with forty-nine windows stretching 
out in a single range. It might be the front of 
an automobile factory if it were less ornate, or 
that of an exposition building were it more beauti- 
ful. In some respects it is reminiscent of the 
Palais Royal at Paris, particularly as to the 
entrance colonnade and gallery facing the Louvre. 

The chief beauty within is undoubtedly the 
magnificent stairway, with its balustrade of 
wrought iron of the period of Louis XVI. The 
Salle de Spectacle is of a certain Third Empire- 
Louis Napoleon distinction, which is saying that 
it is neither very lovely nor particularly plain, 
simply ordinary, or, to give it a French turn 
of phrase, vulgar. 



352 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

One of the most remarkable apartments is 
the Salle des Cartes, the old salon of the Aides 
de Camp, whose walls are ornamented with 
three great plans showing the roads and by- 
paths of the forest, and other decorative panels 
representing the hunt of the time of Louis XV. 

The Chambre a Coucher of the great Napoleon 
is perhaps the most interesting of all the smaller 
apartments, with its strange bed, which in form 
more nearly resembles an oriental divan than 
anything European. Doubtless it is not un- 
comfortable as a bed, but it looks more like a 
tent, or camp, in the open, than anything es- 
sentially intended for domestic use within doors. 
After the great Napoleon, his nephew Napoleon 
III was its most notable occupant, though it 
was last slept in by the Tzar Nicholas II, when 
he visited France in 1901. 

The sleeping-room of the Empress Eugenie 
is fitted up after the style of the early Empire 
with certain interpolations of the mid-nineteenth 
century. The most distinct feature here is the 
battery of linen coffers which Marie Louise 
had had especially designed and built. The 
Salon des Dames d'Honneur, with its double 
rank of nine "scissors chairs," the famous tab- 
ourets de cour, lined up rigidly before the canape 
on which the empress rested, is certainly a re- 




Napoleon s Bedchamber, Compiegne 



Compiegne and Its Forest 353 

markable apartment. This was the decor of 
convention that Madame Sans Gene rendered 
classic. 

Like all the French national palaces Com- 
piegne has a too abundant collection of Sevres 
vases set about in awkward corners which could 
not otherwise be filled, and, beginning with the 
vestibule, this thing is painfully apparent. 

The apartments showing best the Napoleonic 
style in decorations and furnishings are the 
Salon des Huissiers, the Salle des Gardes, the 
Escalier d'Apollon, the Salle de Don Quichotte 

— which contains a series of designs destined 
to have served for a series of tapestries intended 
to depict scenes in the life of the windmill knight 

— the Galerie des Fetes, the Galerie des Cerfs, 
the Salle Coypel, the Salle des Stucs and the 
Salon des Fleurs, through which latter one ap- 
proaches the royal apartments. 

In the sixteenth century, or, more exactly, 
between 1502 and 15 10, was constructed Com- 
piegne's handsome Hotel de Ville, one of the 
most delightful architectural mixtures of Gothic 
and Renaissance extant. It is an architectural 
monument of the same class as the Palais de 
Justice at Rouen or the Hotel Cluny at Paris. 
Its frontispiece is marvellous, the rez-de-chaussee 
less gracious than the rest perhaps, but with the 



354 Royal Palaces and Parks of Prance 

first story blooming forth as a gem of magnif- 
icent proportions and setting. Between the four 
windows of this first story are posed statuesque 
effigies of Charles VII, Jeanne d'Arc, Saint 
Remy and Louis IX. In the centre, in a niche, 
is an equestrian statue of Louis XII, who reigned 
when this monument was being built. A balus- 
trade a jour finishes off this story, which, in turn, 
is overhung with a high, peaked gable, and above 
rise the belfry and its spire, of which the great 
clock dates from 1303, though only put into 
place in 1536. The only false note is sounded 
by the two insignificant, cold and unlovely wings 
which flank the main structure on either side. 
It is a sixteenth century construction unrivalled 
of its kind in all France, more like a Belgian 
town-hall belfry than anything elsewhere to 
be seen outside Flanders, but it is not of the 
low Spanish-Renaissance order as are so many 
of the imposing edifices of occidental and orien- 
tal Flanders. It is a blend of Gothic and Renais- 
sance, and, what is still more rare, the best of 
Gothic and the best of Renaissance. Above 
its facade is a civic belfry, flanked by two slender 
towers. Within the portal-vestibule rises a monu- 
mental stairway which must have been the in- 
spiration of many a builder of modern opera- 
houses. 



Compiegne and Its Forest 355 

Opposite the Hotel Dieu is the poor, rent 
relic of the Tour de Jeanne d'Arc, originally 
a cylindrical donjon of the twelfth century, 
wherein "La Pucelle" was imprisoned in 1430. 

Between the palace and the river are to be 
seen many vestiges of the mediaeval ramparts 
of the town, and here and there a well-defined 
base of a gateway or tower. Mediaevalism is 
rampant throughout Compiegne. 

The park surrounding the palace is quite 
distinct from the wider radius of the Foret de 
Compiegne. It is of the secular, conventional 
order, and its perspectives, looking towards 
the forest from the terrace and vice versa, are 
in all ways satisfying to the eye. 

One of the most striking of these alleyed vistas 
was laid out under the orders of the first Na- 
poleon in 1810. It loses itself in infinity, almost, 
its horizon blending with that of the far distant 
Beaux Monts in the heart of the forest. 

In the immediate neighbourhood of the palace 
are innumerable statues, none of great beauty, 
value or distinction. On the south side runs 
a Cours, or Prado, as it would be called in Cata- 
lonia. The word Cours is of Provencal origin, 
and how it ever came to be transplanted here is 
a mystery. Still here it is, a great tree-shaded 
promenade running to the river. The climate 



356 Roy al Palaces and Parks of France 

of Compiegne is never so blazing hot as to make 
this Cours so highly appreciated as its name- 
sakes in the Midi, but as an exotic accessory to 
the park it is quite a unique delight. 

Within the park may still be traced the out- 
lines of the moat which surrounded the palace 
of Charles V, as well as some scanty remains 
of the same period. 

Another distinctive feature is the famous Ber- 
ceau en Fer, an iron trellis several thousands of 
feet in length, which was built by Napoleon I 
as a reminder to Marie Louise of a similar, but 
smaller, garden accessory which she had known 
at Schoenbrunn. It was a caprice, if you like, 
and rather a futile one since it was before the 
time when artistically worthless things were the 
rage just because of their gigantic proportions. 
Napoleon III cut it down in part, and pruned 
it to more esthetic proportions, and what there 
is left, vine and flower grown, is really charming. 

The Foret de Compiegne as a historic wild- 
wood goes back to the Druids who practiced 
their mysterious rites under its antique shade 
centuries before the coming of the kings, who 
later called it their own special hunting pre- 
serve. Stone hatchets, not unlike the toma- 
hawks of the red man, have been found and 
traced back — well, definitely to the Stone Age, 




bo 



Compiegne and Its Forest 357 

and supposedly to the time when they served 
the Druids for their sacrifices. 

The soldiers of Caesar came later and their 
axes were of iron or copper, and though on the 
warpath, too, their way was one which was 
supposed to lead civilization into the wilder- 
ness. Innumerable traces of the Roman oc- 
cupation are to be found in the forest by those 
who know how to read the signs; twenty-five 
different localities have been marked down by 
the archeologists as having been stations on the 
path blazed by the Legions of Rome. 

After the Romans came the first of the kings 
as proprietors of the forest, and in the moyen- 
age the monks, the barons and the crown itself 
shared equally the rights of the forest. 

Legends of most weird purport are connected 
with various points scattered here and there 
throughout the forest, as at the Fosse Dupuis 
and the Table Ronde, where a sort of ''trial 
by fire" was held by the barons whenever a 
seigneur among them had conspired against another. 
Ariosto, gathering many of his legends from the 
works of the old French chroniclers, did not 
disdain to make use of the Foret de Compiegne 
as a stage setting. 

During the reign of Clothaire the forest was 
known as the For^t de Cuise, because of a royal 



358 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

palace hidden away among the Druid oaks 
which bore the name of Cotia, or Cusia. Until 
1346 the palace existed in some form or other, 
though shorn of royal dignities. It was at this 
period that Philippe VI divided the forests of 
the Valois into three distinct parts in order to 
better regulate their exploitation. 

The Frankish kings being, it would seem, 
inordinately fond of la chasse the Foret de Com- 
piegne, in the spring and autumn, became their 
favorite rendezvous. Alcuin, the historian, noted 
this fact in the eighth century, and described 
this earliest of royal hunts in some detail. In 
715 the forest was the witness of a great battle 
between the Austrasians and the Neustrians. 

Before Francis I with his habitual initiative 
had pierced the eight great forest roads which 
come together at the octagon called the Puits 
du Roi, the forest was not crossed by any thor- 
oughfare; the nearest thing thereto was the 
Chaussee de Brunhaut, a Roman way which 
bounded it on the south and east. 

Louis XIV and Louis XV, in turn, cut numer- 
ous roads and paths, and to the latter were due 
the crossroads known as the Grand Octagone 
and the Petit Octagone. 

It was over one of these great forest roads, 
that leading to Soissons, that Marie Louise, 



Compiegne and Its Forest 359 

accompanied by a cortege of three hundred 
persons, eighty conveyances and four hundred 
and fifty horses, journeyed in a torrential rain, 
in March 1807, when she came to France to 
found a dynasty. 

A marriage had been consummated by proc- 
uration at Vienna, and she set out to actually 
meet her future spouse for the first time at Sois- 
sons. At the little village of Courcelles, on the 
edge of the forest between Soissons and Com- 
piegne, two men enveloped in great protecting 
cloaks had arrived post-haste from Compiegne. 
At the parish church they stopped a moment 
and took shelter under the porch, impatiently 
scanning the horizon. Finally a lumbering her- 
lin de voyage lurched into view, drawn by eight 
white horses. In its depths were ensconced 
two women richly dressed, one a beautiful woman 
of mature years, the other a young girl scarce 
eighteen years. 

The most agitated of the men, he who was 
clad in a gray redingote, sprang hastily to the 
carriage door. He was introduced by the older 
woman as ^'Sa Majeste PEmpereur des Franfaises, 
mon frere,^^ The speaker was one of the sisters 
of Napoleon, Caroline, Queen of Naples; the 
other was the Archduchess Marie Louise, daugh- 
ter of Franz II, Emperor of Austria. 



360 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

An imposing ceremonial had been planned 
for Soissons and the court had been ordered to 
set out from Compiegne with the emperor, in 
order to arrive at Soissons in due time. When 
the actual signal for the departure was given the 
emperor was nowhere to be found. As usual 
he had anticipated things. 

For weeks before the arrival of the empress 
to be Napoleon had passed the majority of his 
waking hours at Paris in the apartments which 
he had caused to be prepared for Marie Louise. 
He selected the colour of the furnishings, and 
superintended the very placing of the furniture. 
Among other things he had planned a boudoir 
which alone represented an expenditure of nearly 
half a million francs. 

Lejeune, who had accompanied Marechal Ber- 
thier to Vienna to arrange the marriage, had 
returned and given his imperial master a glow- 
ing description of the charms of the young arch- 
duchess who was to be his bride. The emperor 
compared his ideal with her effigy on medals 
and miniatures and then worked even more 
ardently than before that her apartments should 
be worthy of her when she arrived. 

It was just following upon this fever of excite- 
ment that Napoleon and the court had repaired 
to Compiegne. So restless was the emperor that 



Compiegne and Its Forest 361 

he could hardly bide the time when the arch- 
duchess should arrive, and it was thus that he set 
out with Murat to meet the approaching cortege. 

The pavilion which had been erected for the 
meeting was left to the citizens of the neighbour- 
hood, and the marvellous banquet which had 
been prepared by Bausset was likewise abandoned. 
Napoleon had no time to think of dining. 

All the roadside villages between Soissons 
and Compiegne were hung with banners, and 
the populace appeared to be as highly excited 
as the contracting parties. It still rained a deluge, 
but this made no difference. Two couriers 
at full gallop came first to Compiegne, crying: 
"Place": "Place": The eight white horses and 
the herlin de voyage followed. Before one had 
hardly time to realize what was passing. Napoleon 
and his bride whisked by in a twinkling. 

At nine o'clock an outpost in the park at Com- 
piegne announced the arrival of the emperor 
and his train. At ten o'clock a cannon shot 
rang out over the park and the emperor and 
empress passed into the chateau to proceed with 
certain indispensable presentations; then to souper, 
a petite souper intime^ we are assured. 

On the morrow all the world of the assembled 
court met the empress and avowed that she had 
that specious heaute du diahle which has ever 



362 Royal Palaces and Parks of France 

pleased the French connoisseur of beautiful 
women. They went further, however, and stated 
that in spite of this ravishing beauty she lacked 
the elegance , which should be the possession of 
an empress of the French. The faithful Ber- 
thier silenced them with the obvious statement 
that since she pleased the emperor there was 
nothing more to be said, or thought. 

Flying northward on the great highroad lead- 
ing out from Paris to Chantilly and Compiegne 
gadabout travellers have never a thought that 
just beyond Pont Saint Maxence, almost in plain 
view from the doorway of the Inn of the Lion 
d'Argent of that sleepy little town, is a gabled 
wall which represents all that remains of the 
"Maison de Philippe de Beaumanoir/' called 
the Cour Basse. 



THE END 



INDEX 



Aiguillon, Duchesse d', 217 

Alcuin, 358 

Alexander, Emperor, 221, 

330, 349 
Alphonse XIII of Spain, 7 
Amboise, 26, 28, 86 
Amboise, Bussy d', 72 
Ancre, Marechal d', 67 
Andelot, Coligny d', 72-73 
Andilly, Arnauld d', 267 
Anet, Chateau d', 29, 11 1 
Angennes, Jacques d', 44, 299, 

311 
Angers, Chateau d', 22 
Anglas, Boissy d', 114 
Angouleme, Duchesse d', 321 
Anjou, Dues d', 22, 136, 212 
Anne of Austria, 96-97, 136- 

137, 284-287, 289, 347 
Arc, Jeanne d', 345-346, 354 
Ardennes, 54 
Arlors, 25 

Artois, Comtesse d', 176 
Aubert, Jean, 333 
Aubigne, D', 299 
Aumale, Due d', 29, 327, 331- 

Z32, 335, 338, 339 
Auvergne, Loms d', 162-163 
Ayen, Due d\ 299 

Bagatelle, Chateau de, 163, 

203-206 
Bailly, Sylvain, 104 
Barbes, 173 
Barbison, 200-201 
Baril, Jean, 25 
Barry, Mme. du, 211, 242-243, 

245, 250, 275, 329, 348 
Bassompierre, 195, 262 
Bastille, 71, 145, 173 



Bausset, 361 

Baviere, Isabeau de, 69, 151, 

182 
Beauharnais, Eugene, 220, 

222 
Beauharnais, Hortense, 215, 

220, 221 
Beaujon, 164 

Beaumont, Cardinal de, 179 
Beauvais, Hotel de, 11 
Becker, General, 221 
Becket, Thomas a, 182 
Bedford, Duke of, 69 
Belleveu, 241-242 
Berquin, Louis de, 67 
Berry, Due de, 165 , 

Berry, Duchesse de, 50, 321 
Berthier, Marechal (see 

Wagram, Prince de) 
Blanchard, 130 
Blanqui, 173 
Blois, 21, 26, 305 
Blondel, 37 
Blucher, 173, 209 
Boileau, 328 
Boissy, Forest of, 49 
Bonaparte, Caroline, 359 
Bonaparte, Jerome, 147 
Bonaparte, Louis, 235 
Bonaparte, Lucien, 145 
Bonheur, Rosa, 202 
Bordeaux, Due de, 166 
Borghese, Princesse, 208 
Bossuet, 328 
Boulanger, 200 
Boullee, 164 
'Boulogne, Bois de, 168, 174, 

175, 203, 206, 209 
Bourbon Family, 164-165, 

329, 331, 341 



363 



364 



Index 



Bourbon, Palais, 120, 159-161 
Bourdaloue, 328 
Bourg-la-Reine, 3 
Boyceau, 30, 262, 270 
Breton, Mme. de, 121-122 
Brunei, 223 

Brunswick, Duchesse de, 154 
Bullant, Jean, 109, 327, 336 

Cadoudal, 173 

Camhaceres, Consul, 115-116 

Cardinal, Palais {see Royal, 
Palais) 

Carpeaux, 118 

Carrier-Belleuse, 202 

Cartouche, 67 

Cellini, 182, 192 

Chahanne, Comte de, y^ 

Chahrol, 147 

Chalgrin, 154 

Chambiges, Pierre, 91, 281- 
282 

Chamblay, 54-56 

Chambord, 71, 86, 310 

Chamillard, Michael, 252-253 

Champaigne, Philippe de, 135 

Champ olUon-Figeac, 184 

Chantilly, Chateau and For- 
est of, 324-340, 362 

Chappell, Comte des, 72 

Charenton, 152 

Charlemagne, 18, 116, 281 

Charles II, 344 

Charles V, 22, 23, 25, 62-63, 
66, 68, 77, 82-84, i70j i90> 
247, 281, 327, 344, 356 

Charles VI, 62,, 66, 69, 176- 
177, 229 

Charles VII, 69, 182, 190, 346, 

354 
Charles VIII, 21, 299 
Charles IX, 89, 91-94, 106, 

108-110, 171, 209, 291, 312, 

Z27 
Charles X, 57, 108, 118, 146, 

173, 192, 204, 212, 237-238, 

303, 317, 319-320, 349 
Charles IV, Emperor, 63 



Charles V, Emperor, 85, 88, 
346 

Charles /, of England, 104, 
137, 289 

Charles the Bold of Bur- 
gundy (see Charolais, 
Comte de) 

Charolais, Comte de, 177-178 

Chartres, Dues de (see Or- 
leans, Dues de) 

Chateauroux, Mme. de, 250 

Chatou, 210 

Chenonceaux, 26, 32, 71 

Chevalier, Etienne, 339 

Childerhert /, 216 

Christina, Queen, 222 

Cinq-Mars, 72,, 134 

Clagny, Chateau de, 228, 277 

Clement, Jacques, 93, 230-232 

Clothaire, 357 

Clo tilde, 61 

Clevis, 61, 76, 216 

Coictier, Jacques, 66, 152 

Colbert, 3, 87, 98, 100, 269 

Coligny, Admiral, 93 

Collo, Jean, 27 

Commynes, 177 

Compiegne, Palace and For- 
est of, 52-53, 165, 232, 335, 
342-362 

Conciergerie, 61, 65-68 

Conde Family, 72,, 269, 324, 

327-331, 333, 337, 339 
Conflans, Chateau de, 2, 175- 

179 
Constantine, Emperor, 344 
Consulat, Palais du {see 

Luxembourg, Palais du) 
Conti Family, 211, 242, 327 
Corneille, 7Z, I33, 151 
Corot, 200 
C otter eau, Jean, 299, 300-305, 

307 
Courcelles, 359 
Cousin, Jean, 170 
Coypel, 137 
Cromwell, 137 
Crojsat, 162 



Index 



365 



Dagobert, 54 

Damiens, 67, 263-264 

Dante, 24 

Dardellc, 123 

Daru, 100 

Datibigny, 200 

Daumesnil, Baron, 173 

Daumet, Henri, 332 

Debanes, 22 

Debrosse, Jacques, 64, 154, 

158 
Decamps, 202, 338 
Delille, Abbe, 143 
Delorme, Marion, y2> 
Delorme, Philibert, 34, 108- 

III, 189 
Denecourt, 198-199, 201 
Deputes, Chambre des (j^^ 

Bourbon, Palais) 
Desmoulins, Camille, 145 
Dm^, 200 
Directoire, Palais du {see 

Luxembourg, Palais du) 
Donon, 100 
Dorbay, no 
Drouais, 211 
Ducamp, Maxine, 126 
Ducerceau, 92, 94, no, 112 
Ducrot, General, 222 
Dugastz, 232 
Dupaira, 95 
Duperac, no 
Dupre, 200 
Durfort, Madame, 49 

Egalite, Palais (j^^ Royal, 

Palais) 
Enghien, Chateau d', 340 
Enghien, Due d\ 169, 172- 

174, 331 
Epernon, Dues d', 103, 232 
Erard, Sebastian, 210 
E^f^, Maria d\ 290 
Estival, Convent of, 49 
Estrees, Gabrielle d\ 102, 210 
l^tampes, Duchesse d', 86, 

185, 192, 294 
Etoiles, Normand d\ 204 



Eugenie, Empress, 120-122, 

125-126, 238, 350, 352 
Evans, Dr., 122 



Fallieres, President, 166-167 

Famin, 314-315 

Faure, Felix, 56, 58-59 

Feraud, 114 

Ferrare, Due de, 70 

Flandre, Comfe de, 82 

Flavy, Guillaume de, 345 

Fleury, Chateau de, 195 

Fontaine, 99, 127 

Fontainebleau, Forest of, 6, 
50, 52, 181, 183, 196-202, 
279, 294 

Fontainebleau, Palais de, 2, 
26, 28, 33, 34, 87, 91, III, 
180-196, 329, 335, 336 

Fouche, 221 

Fould, 53 

Fouquet, lean, 339 

Fouquet, Nicolas, 269 

Fragonard, 211 

Francine, Thomas and Alex- 
andre, 196 

Francis I, 8, 10, 12, 16, 21, 32, 
44-45, 62, 64, 67, 77, 79, 81, 
84-89, 108, no, 170, 181, 
183-187, 189-191, 194, 209, 
229, 281-282, 290, 292, 299, 
306, 310-31 1, 321, 326, 346, 
358 

Franz II, 359 



Gabriel, 276, 348 
Gaillon, Chateau de, 33 
Ganne, Pere, 200 
Girardini, 160 
Gisors, Castle of, 82 
Gondi, 230, 232 
Goujon, Jean, 89, 90 
Grand Trianon, 39, 248, 2^, 

259, 260, 263, 264, 274-276 
Gregory of Tours, 215 
Grevy, Jules, 58 



366 



Index 



Gros, Baron, 338 
Grosbois, Chateau de, 51 
Guilbert, Abbe, 184 
Guillain, Guillaume, 282 
Guise, Dues de, 70, 72-73, 103 

Hamon, 200 

Harlay - Cfauvallon,- Arch- 
bishop De, 178-179 

Haussmann, Baron, 3, 13, 152 

Hebert, 201 

Hennequin, Dame Gillette, 
178 

Henri II, 26, 32, 44, 69-70, 78, 
85, 87, 89, 90, 91, 108, no, 
170, 193, 229, 230, 282, 294- 

29s, 311, 327 
Henri III, 29, 92-93, loi, 109, 

230-232, 312 
Henri IV, 16, 26, 27, 29, 45- 
46, 71-72, 87, 89, 92, 94-95, 
102-103, 111-112, 118, 172, 
186, 190, 191, 194-197, 206, 
209, 210, 231, 232, 238, 282- 
283, 306, Z27 
Henrietta of England, 233, 

289 
Henriette de France, 104, 137- 
Henry V of England, 63, 326 
Henry VI of England, 63, 69 
Henry VIII of England, 311 
Herivaux, Bois de, 340 
Hohenzollern, Prince de, 53 
Hortense, Queen, 330 
Hugo, Victor, 73 
Hugues Capet, 62 

Institut, Palais de V, 159-160 
Isabey {Pere), 40 

Jacob of Cologne, 87 
Jacque, 200 

James II 'j)f England, 290 
Jarnac, Gui Chabot de, 294 
Joachim, Prince, 52, 56 
John II of France, 83, 170 
John VIII, Pope, 344 
Joinville, Forest of, 169 



Josephine, Empress, 174, 215, 

217-222, 323 
Justice, Palais de {see La 

Cite, Palais de) 

Karr, Alphonse, 149 

La Barauderie, De, 30 

Labaudy, 50 

La Brosse, 102 

La Cite, Palais de, 12, 61-68, 

75, 81, 82, 93, 152, 153, 170 
La Chdtaigneraie, 294 
Laffitte, Pierre, 212, 213, 243 
Lambesc, Prince de, 144 
La Muette, Chateau de, iii, 

203, 209-210 
Lancret, 338 
Langeais, 33 
Lannes, Marechal, 213 
Laporte, 284 
La Quintinye, 267-269 
La Reine Blanche, Chateau 

de, 341 
Las chant, 232 
Latini, Brunetto, 24 
Lauzan, 178, 289 
La Valliere, Louise de, 289 
Lebrun, Charles, 97, 255, 256 
Lebrun, Consul, 115 
Le Calabrese, Henri, 27 
Lecouteux de Canteleu, 217, 

222 
Ledoux, 211, 243 
Lefuel, 100 
Lejeune, 360 
Leloir, 239 
L'Elysee, Palais de, 153, 162- 

167 
Lemercier, Jacques, 96, 100, 

135, 262 
LeMoyne, 239 
Le Notre, 16, 22, 25, 26, 28, 

30, 31, 35, 39, 40, 104, 128, 

129-130, 179, 233, 248, 264- 

266, 270, 277, 288, 292, 307- 

308, 327, 330 
Lepaute, 240 
Le Roy, 262 



Index 



367 



Les Bruyeres, 222 
Lescot, Pierre, 88-90, 109 
Lesdtguieres, Duchesse de, 

179 
Levau, 97-98, no, 247, 249 
Lomenci, Martial de, 247 
Longueil, Rene de, 212 
Longueville, Mme. de, 73, 327 
Loret, II 

Lorraine, Cardinal de, in 
Lorraine, Chevalier de, 2^3 
Louis I, 344 
Louis V, 344 
Louis VI, 281 
Louis VII, 169, 181, 182 
Louis IX, 23, 62, 77, 169, 176, 

182, 190, 281, 295, 341, 344, 

354 

Louis XI, 21, 66, 69, 152, 172, 
177-178, 299, 326 

Louis XII, 26, 69, 299, 305, 
306, 326, 354 

Louis XIII, 16, 48, 87, 96, 
112, 132, 134, 136, 171, 189, 
190, 194, 209, 247, 249, 262, 
266, 283-284, 306, 347 

Louis XIV, II, 12, 14, 16, 17, 
29, 33, 38, 39, 46, 48, 49, 50, 
85, 87, 97-99, 104, 112, 118, 
127, 136-137, 152, 158, 170, 
178, 186, 189, 190, 206, 217, 
223-224, 226, 233, 240, 245, 
247, 249, 251-253, 255-257, 
261, 264, 268, 270, 273, 274, 
277, 283, 284, 288-290, 291, 
293, 296, 297, 299, 303-307, 
312, 328, 345, 347, 358 

Louis XV, 4, 14, 16, 17, 38, 
48, 112, 152, 162, 163, 174, 
185, 186, 189, 190, 192, 205, 
207, 209, 211, 227, 241, 243, 
246, 250, 253, 263-264, 275- 
276, 284, 290, 312, 320, 323, 

, 329, 345, 348, 350-352, 358 

^Louis XVI, 37, 39, 41, 43, 57, 
108, 113, 118, 143, 144, 152, 
154, 210, 213, 227, 250, 261, 
235-236, 352, 356, 358-362 



290, 312-313, 316, 320, 322, 

348, 351 
Louis XVIII, 118, 161, 174, 

237, 250, 316, 349 
Louis Philippe, 105, 108, 117- 

118, 146, 149, 154, 162, i6(5, 

186, 194, 199, 207, 238, 254- 

255, 350 (see also Orleans 

Family) 
Louveciennes, Chateau de, 

210-212, 242, 288 
Louvre, 4, 12, 13, 22, 25, 32, 

44, 62, 68, 75-105, 108, 109, 

no. III, 112, 118, 124, 131, 

132, 152, 233, 351 
Lude, Comtesse de, 49 
Luxembourg, Jean de, 346 
Luxembourg, Palais de, 28, 

40, 115, 136, 144, 153-158 

Machine de Marly, 223-224 
Madrid, Chateau de, in 
Magnan, Marechal, 242 
Maine, Due de, 159 
Maintenon, Chateau de, 242, 

296-308, 312 
Maintenon, Mme. de, 158-159, 

194, 227, 249, 274, 296-299, 

302-303, 305-308, 312, 347 
Maisons-Laffitte, Chateau de, 

203, 212-214, 288 
Malmaison, Chateau de, 215- 

223, 323 
Mandrin, 67 

Mansart, Frangois, 212-213 
Mansart, Jules Hardouin, 35, 

137, 179, 226, 233, 241, 249, 

274, 276, 291, 327, 333 
Mantes, 55 

Mantes, Mile, de, 159 
Marat, 116 
Marceliano, Pucello and 

Ednie, 26 * 

Marie .Antoinette, 49, iiS, 

194, 204, 210, 237, 245, 256, 

276-277, 320, 322, 349 
Marie Louise, 6, 117, 208, 
Marie Sophie, 320 



368 



Index 



Marie Therese, ii 

Marigny, Enguerrand de, 62, 

172 
Marigny, Marquis de, 99 
Marlotte, 201 

Marly-le-Roi {or -le-^ourg 
or -le-Chatel), 2, 224-228, 
283, 288 
Mary Tudor, of England, 69 
Marseilles, 91 
Massena, Due de, 217 
Masson, Frederic, 236 
Matignon, Marechal de, 70 
Mayenne, Due de, loi 
Masarin, Cardinal, 87, 104, 

136, 159, 169, 283-285 
Mazarin, Palais {see Institut, 

Palais de 1') 

Medici, Catherine de, 26, 31, 

33, 44, 48, 68, 69-71, 90-91, 

93-94, 97, 107, 108, no, in, 

171, 195, 230, 247, 311 

Medici, Marie de, 72, 103, 

154, 155, 158, 206, 347 
Menars et de Marigny, Mar- 
quis de, 163 
Menours, Jacques de, 30, 262- 

263 
Mercogliano, 18 
Messonier, 338 
Metezeau, Thibaut, 92, 94 
Metternich, Prince de, 121 
Meudon, Bois de, 240 
Meudon, Chateau de, 34, in 
Michelet, 192 
Mignard, 233, 239, 306 
Millet, Eugene, 290, 291 
Millet, Jean Frangois, 200, 

201 
Mirabeau, 172 
Moliere, 73, 104, 178, 249 
Molineaux, Chateau de, 278 
Mollet, Qaude, 29, 30 
Mollien, 100 

Monconseil, Marquise de, 204 
Mongomere, Comte de, 67 
Montansier, Due de, 269 
Montargis, 28 



Montebello, Marechal de, 213 
Montespan, Marquise de, 159, 

249, 275, 312 
Montesson, Marquise de, 234 
Montgaillard, 50 
MontgolHer, 130 
Montgomeri, Sieur de, 70 
Montmartre, 288 
Montmorency Family, 178, 

324, 326-327, 339 
Montmorency, Forest of, 49, 

288 
Montpensier, Mile, de, 136 
Moreau, Architect, 138 
Moreau, Hegesippe, 123-124 
Moskowa, Prince de la, 53 
Muette, Chateau de la, in 
Murat, Princes de, 52-56, 165, 

235, 361 
Murillo, 164 
Musee de Cluny, 12 
M us set, De, 274 

Nacret, 239 

Nanterre, 281 

Nanteuil, Celestin, 200 

Napoleon I, 6, 13, 40, 51-52, 
57, 79, 88, 100, 108, 1 1 5-1 18, 
127, 129, 145, 154, 155, 160, 
165, 171, 173-174, 180, 186, 
187-188, 190, 194, 208, 213, 
217-222, 235-237, 250, 254, 
274, 296, 298, 313-316, 320, 
321, 322, 345, 349, 352, 355- 
356, 359-362 

Napoleon III, 13, 58, 92, 100, 
105, 118- 122, 147, 152, 166, 
195, 197, 222, 238, 290, 313, 
318, 323, 345, 350-352, 356 

Nattier, 338 

Neckar, 144 

Nemours, Due de, 70 

Neufforge, De, 37 

Neuilly and its Chateauj 206* 
209, 238 

Nicholas II, 352 

Nicolo dell' abbate, 193 

Nigra, Chevalief, 121 



Index 



369 



Noailles, Dues de, 298-300, 

306 
Noisy, Chateau de, 278 
Nolhac, M. de, 274 

Olivier, Emile, 125 
Oppenard, 137 

Orgemont, Marguerite d', 326 
Orleans, Dues d', 137-140, 

143, 144-149, 161, 209, 233, 

234, 286-287, ZZ7 
Orleans, Palais d' {see 

Royal, Palais) 
Ormesson, D', yz 
Osman, 230-231 
OursinSf Juvenal des, 66 

Palatine, Princesse, 233 

Palissy, Bernard, 31-32 

Panseron, 2)7 

Pare, Ambroise, 171 

Paul, Saint Vincent de, y2i 

Penthievre, Due de, 306, 312, 

322 
Pepin-le-Bref, 343 
Percier, 100, 127 
Perrault, Charles, 98-99 
Petit Luxembourg, Palais du, 

155, 157 
Petit Trianon, 39, 260, 264, 

274, 276-277, 329 
Pfnor, 184 
Philippe Auguste, 12, 62, 77, 

80-82, 169, 182, 190 
Philippe III, 62, 177 
Philippe IV, 62, 170, 176, 182, 

190, 295 
Philippe VI, 170, 358 
Philippe II, of Spain, 69 
Philippe-EgaUte, 138-139 
Picard, Achille, 125 
Pichegreu, 173 
Pierrefonds, 290, 335 
Pisan, Christine de, 23 
Pius VII, 6, 115, 194, 23s 
Poirson, 184 
Poissin, 164 



Poissy, 23, 232, 292, 293 
Poitiers, Diane de, 29, 44, 70- 

71, 193 
Pompadour, Mme. de, 163, 
204-205, 241-242, 246, 250, 

275, 348 
Potter, Paul, 164 
Poussin, 338 
Prieur, Barthelemy, 196 
Primaticcio, 87, 188, 192, 193 
Provence, Comte de, 154 

Quatre Nations, Palais des 
{see Institut, Palais de 1') 

Rabelais, 322 

Racine, 297, 303, 308, 328 

Rambouillet, Chateau and 

Forest of, 44-45, 50, 55-59, 

242, 296, 298, 309-323, 328, 

335, Z2>^ 
Rambouillet, Seigneur de, 299 
Raphael, 87, 170 
Raspail, 173 
Ravaillac, 67, 102 
Redon, 128 

Regnier, Henri de, 244 
Remusat, Mme. de, 174, 219 
Rets, Marechal de, 247 
Revolution, Palais de la (see 

Royal, Palais) 
Richelieu, Cardinal, 72, 73, 

95, 100, 131-139, 151, 178, 

179, 216-217 
Rigaud, 307 
Rigby, 334 

Robert II, 62, 190, 281 
Rochefort, Henri, 120-121 
Romain, Mme., 141 
Ronsard, 34, 90, 109, iii 
Roosevelt, Theodore, 166-167 
Rosier, De, 210 
Rosny, 55 
Rosso, 182, 192 
Rousseau, Theodore, 200, 201 
Rousselle, 123 
Rouvray, Forest of, 229 
Rovigo, Due de, 221 



370 



Index 



Royal, Palais, 131-150, 284, 

351 
Royale, Place (see Vosges, 

Place des) 
Rubens, 164 
Rueil (see Malmaison) 

Sadi-Carnot, 58 

Saint Cloud, Palais de, 13, 
93, 228, 229-243 

Saint Cyr, 296-298, 303 

Saint Germain-en-Laye, 28, 
91, III, 136, 203, 206, 223, 
232, 242, 256, 279-295, 311, 

324, 336, 345 

Saint Germain, Forest of, 
212, 292-295 

Saint James, Baudart de, 208 

Saint Louis (see Louis IX) 

Saint Maur, Chateau de, iii 

Saint Ouen, 54 

Saint-Simon, 179, 262, 348 

Sarto, Del, 192 

Savoie, Louise de, 108 

Savoie, Philippe de, 66 

Scarron, Mme. (see Mainte- 
non, Mme. de) 

Schickler, Baron, 318 

Schopin, 195 

Senat, Palais du {see Luxem- 
bourg, Palais du) 

Senlis, 6 

Senlis, Foret de, 340 

Senlis, Seigneurs de, 324 

Seran, Comtesse de, 275 

Serlio, 88, 185 

Serres, Olivier de, 33 

Servandoni, 112 

Sevigne, Mme. de, 179, 277, 
328 

Soissons, 359-361 

Soyecourt, Marquis de, 212 

Sualem, Rennequin, 223 

Sully, Due de, 102, 103 

Talmon, Prince de, 73 
Tesse, Marquis de, 73 



Thermes, Palais des, 12, 62, 

. ^53 

Thierry III, 224 

Thiers, President, 122-123 

Thomery, 202 

Thou, De, 73 

Temple, The, 144 

Tiercelin, Jean, 108 

Tillet, Maison du, 232 

Toulouse, Comte de, 321 

Toulouse, Comtesse de, 312, 
320 

Tournelles, Palais des, 66, 68- 
71, 81, 152 

Trepsat, 313-314 

Trianon {see Grand Tria- 
non) 

Triboulet, 186 

Tribunat, Palais du {see 
Royal, Palais) 

Trochu, General, 120 

Tuileries, Palace and Gar- 
dens of the, 3, 13, 31, 33-34, 
40, 76, 78, 82, 91, 92, 94, 
106-130, 131, 155, 157, 166, 
218, 227, 317 

Turenne, 73 

Turgot, 100 

Valerian, Mont, 288 

Vallet, Pierre, 27 

Valois, Charles, Comte de, 

170 
Valois, Elizabeth de, 69 
Valois, Marguerite de (1492- 

1549), 8, 10 
Valois, Marguerite de (1553- 

1615), 10, 69, III, 209 
Van Loo, 164 
Vasari, 181 
Vauban, 252 
Vaux-le-Vicomte, 36, 42 
Vendome, Due de, 102, 206 
Vernet, Joseph, 164, 239 
Verneuil, Marquis de, 2.Qfj 
Veronese, 338 
Versailles, 2, 36, 42, 85, 88, 

99, 112, 118, 145, 163, 180, 



Index 



371 



196, 205, 215, 223-224, 226, 
228, 239, 240, 242, 244-278, 

279, 283, 29(5, 305, 324, 334, 

335, 2,Z6, 350 
Vesinet, Bois de, 288 
Vexin, Comte de, 159, 
Vignole, 188 
Vignon, 113 
Villa Normande, 54 
Villeray, Marquis de, 299 
Villeroy, Marquis Neuville 

de, 108 
Villeroy, Marechal de, 178 
Villers-Cotterets, 28, 165, 346 
Vincennes, Chateau de, 168- 

175, 331, 345 



Vincennes, Bois de, 168, 174- 

175, 177 
Vinci, Leonardo da, 87, 192 
Visconti, 100 

Vivonne, Frangois de, 294 
Voltaire, 263 
Von Ostade, 164 
Vosges, Place des, 71-74, 152. 

Wagram, Prince de, 51, 52, 

360, 362 
Wallace, Sir Richard, 205 
Wellington, 208-209 
William I, Emperor, 255 
Wolsey, 132 



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